William Shakespeare
“Shakespeare sucks, and you all are stupid to like him.”
William "Old Silly Billy Shakey" Shakespeare, also known as Darth Shakespeare, Destroyer of worlds by his German name Wilhelm Scheißehosen, was a writer and poet who wrote text books for generations of bored students. They are called 'Comedies', 'Tragedies', 'Histories' and 'Sonnets' but all add up to hours of boredom, incomprehension and derision when taught in class. His Complete Shopping Lists, however, are regarded as some of the greatest works of English Literature and have provided scholars with endless debate and discussion.
Shakespeare was perhaps the most important person in English history he has put 135 sayings into the English language like 'fair play', 'Knock, knock! Who's there?', ‘What's done is done’, ‘no shit Shylock‘ and 'Can I compare thee to a pint of lager?'. He had a funny beard and went through life wearing the same fancy dress, though pretty much everyone then were wearing weird duds then. ironically, his name is an anagram of "i am a weakish speller" which he was, playing with words and inventing his own language in the process. Yes. Shakespeare was a 22 carat smart arse.
Life and Times
Shakespeare was born in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England in 1564 on the site where a huge ugly theatre now stands in his dishonour. His parents were the football goalkeeper Dave 'Shaka' Hislop and trailer park beauty Britney Spears. It seems to have been a happy childhood. Spurning his father's offer to become an apprentice footballer or his mother's suggestion he marry her little sister to 'keep it all in the family', the young genius decided to become an actor . It is said he got this desire to prance around on stage after seeing Anne Hathaway whip out her baps in Brokeback Mountain. Shakespeare fell in love with her and sent many poems, dried seed samples and other odds and ends to declare his love for 'fair,sweet, big droopy Anne'. She responded - and as Anne was already living in her own cottage, invited young 'Billy' to live with her and get fruitful in bed. Which they did. It saved on going down to the tavern and getting beastly drunk.
Now in a secure environment, Shakespeare decided to also try his hand at writing. He started out in writing dud cheques and posting out in impossible offers to win the local lottery but the budding writer decided he was too good to be a cheap fraudster. No. If he was going to make it into a real career opportunity, the answer was to become a writer and rake in the lolly that way.
Shakespeare ordered boxes of paper and freshly plucked quill pens, ready to bang out his works as if working on a literary production line. He placed a stuffed monkey on the table and got down to it. In Anne's humble cottage, the industrious Shakespeare bashed out tragedies, comedies, histories, pastorals, pastoral-comedies, historical-pastorals, tragical-histories, tragical-comical-historical-pastorals, and several Simpsons episodes, all in the space of a few days. Hoping to get them published, he loaded up a horse and cart every day and sent the manuscripts to publishers in London.
However, every night would come the rejection letters and people abusing him for spelling errors. One publisher even suggested he change his name to Wendy Shakespeare and write bodice ripper romances or that if he knew any wizard school boys called Harry Potter, a fortune would beckon. Shakespeare refused to compromise. He stood on Anne's cottage roof one night, stark naked and shouted out his defiance of ignorant publishers as 'whoremongers' and 'the dribblers of piffle'.
Shakespeare was also a bit lonely as his wife Anne had disappeared to work on a few more plays across the ocean and so wasn't there to comfort the distraught, frustrated writer. Then a friend suggested he write to the people responsible for printing text books for school children and said they were looking for any old rubbish to fill up an important educational requirement. Shakespeare agreed and the next day dumped everything he had done outside the local school for them to pass on his manuscripts. The text book publishers accepted them without checking and sent them to the printers. Today all children who study Shakespeare owe these people a giant raspberry.
Works
Shakespeare is also known for his plays as being precursors for today's more lucrative entertainment genres, such as pornography, most notably a saucy little musical called "As You Like Dick"featuring Jacobean porn star/terrorist Guy Fawkes (stage name, The Foxy Guy with the Dynamite Stick) .However, porn plays retained a lot more dignity back in the late 1500s than today's features, and a lady's ankle being shown was as hardcore as it got back then. Such displays would automatically give the play a rating of XXX, while sexual activities would go as far as the male admiring his lady's ankles - or perhaps even stretch as far as the buying of new socks. Many literary critics believe that Shakespeare's plays were the precursors to today's most popular sitcoms. His comic masterpieces Everybody Loves Titus Andronicus, My Name is Earl of Gloucester, Harlotry in the City, and Falstaff Towers about a fat bloke running a brothel/hotel have particularly influenced many modern sitcom writers.
The peak of Shakespeare's career came when he wrote Hamlet: ANOTHER really boring, pointless play, whcih sold more copies than the field guide to grass and higher grade math textbooks combined. He then preceded to write and direct his next play, Romeo and Juliet which was based on the life of Pamela Anderson, and her marriage to Borat from Kazakhstan.
Shakespeare also wrote the Complete Seduction Guide for Your Average Man. This guide went on to sell more copies than the dictionary. Soon after the success of this guide, Shakespeare was sued as it was said at the time spurned the affections of their women and chased forthwith with their own sex and so it was banned to maintain the English birthrate. Those who kept their copies would later be instrumental in forming the band Queen in honour of Elizabeth I. He lost the court battle and was left with a shilling.
In order to clear his debts, Shakespeare settled down to work on his next masterpiece. Out of the public eye for several years, Shakespeare returned in 1612 with his masterpiece production The Taming of the Shrew. Met with widespread critical and commercial acclaim, the play cleared up his debts and made him wealthy once more. Modern producers wanted the play to have worldwide response and thus adapted it for the screen as High School Musical. It was so successful that it immediately spawned successful sequels.
The Authorship Controversy
In 1767 a painting was found depicting Shakespeare spitting on the shoes of Francis Bacon and head butting Christopher Marlowe. This blew the cover of the whole Shakespeare myth. It was revealed that four aspiring playwrights (who also played darts, scrabble, and basketball) had come up with a plan to use the 'Shakespeare name' as pseudonym. Besides Bacon and Marlowe, the others in the literary conspiracy were Edward de Vere and the chain smoking Sir Walter Raleigh. Wishing to avoid tax, the four men had convinced Shakespeare to be their 'cover man' but had then got worried when Shakespeare became convinced he was the new Woody Allen and had started to claim he had written all the works subscribed to his name. Then to keep up the cover, Shakespeare had arranged Marlowe's murder in a pub brawl, Bacon's death when he was hit by a frozen chicken in a supermarket and Raleigh's execution by King James I for 'infecting the royal personage with passive smoking' . Only De Vere seems to have died naturally though the inquest did wonder why the Earl of Oxford (as he was by then) had died inside a wardrobe with an orange in his mouth and wearing just a pair of soiled breeches.
Other Controversies and Death
William Shakespeare has also won a Grammy for "Best New Rap Artist", an accolade many attributed to the quality of his debut album, "Much Ado About Huffing", an album with subliminal messages of the dangers of drugs. His follow up, "MacMeth" sadly did not repeat this success. The term "waxing lyrical" is credited to Shakespeare, whom often could be found busting mad rhymes under the glow of candle light. Shakespeare, or "Bardpac" as he was known to close friend Dr. Dre was involved in a long-running turf war with the other great singer/songwriter of his age, Cliff Richard. He created many compilation albums, most notably with Bob The Builder ("To Do It Or Not To Do It") and Teletubbies (Suck It Up Noo-noo, Be-yatch).
Shortly before his death, Shakespeare wanted a sequel to his play "The Merry Chavs of Windsor." However, he was so lazy, he couldn't do it himself. Despite this, however, he managed to pull himself together long enough to scribble something down about storm. He travelled forward in time to the year 1913. He told George Saxe-Coburg-Gotha-Bartholemew-Tiffany-Weasel and Wilhelm von Hohenzollern, two cousins, to write that sequel. Shakespeare told Mr. Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to start dating Barbara Windsor, and to change his last name from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor. Thus, "The Merry Wives of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha" was born. However, Windsor and von Hohenzollern could not decide on a topic, and, a year later, got into a big fight. This resulted in von Hohenzollern losing, and the tyranny of some random Kraut began.
At the time of his death, from intellectual and sexual exhaustion, Shakespeare was working on a play entitled Dude, Where Is My Codpiece?. Only nine people have ever bothered reading this unfinished manuscript, of whom four say it is bullshit, three have declined to pass comment, one was David Icke, who didn't really understand it, and one thought that it could be adapted into an entertaining movie, if perhaps the codpiece was replaced with some other object: say, a vehicle. History has proven that person wrong. The lost Codpiece play is reputed to have the greatest concentration of fart jokes found in any written work in any language.
(Incidentally, Michael Moore was also looking for his own codpiece, which he wears to political demonstrations and award ceremonies, when he wrote Dude, Where's My Country?. His publishers, fearing litigation from Shakespeare's ghost,[1] pressured Moore into removing all mention of the codpiece. But that's a different story.)
Another famous controversy is whether or not to care about Shakespeare's poems. It has been found that only 8% of Americans know that Shakespeare wrote poems (strange, because research has shown that really only 4% of Americans know who Shakespeare is). Many new publishers of Shakespeare Complete Works have been forced to omit any or all of Shakespeare's poems/sonnets, under pressure from the WWF, who claim that the paper used up to produce the poems section of these Complete Works isn't worth it.
Only 10% of American schools mention Shakespeare in their curriculum. A mere 2% of Shakespeare fans do not eat tea. 100% of Britons know who Shakespeare is and brag about him on a weekly basis.
Shakespeare's actual death still remains a mystery to Shakespearean scholars. Many believe that Shakespeare was flagrantly beaten to death with copies of Hamlet my a mob of 10th graders. The students were irate after a semester of discussing the nuances of Hamlet like whether or not Hamlet ever pulled an Oedipus, and whether or not Hamlet's ghost visits were induced by massive amounts of Opium.
Filmography
- Free Willy (1261)
- West Side Toy Story (1965)
- 7-Up (1998)
- The Transsexual Lion King (many claim this film was ripped off by the play Hamlet but as there is no evidence for this it is most likely not true; it's probably just what English teachers said because they're jealous that Hamlet could not be as good as any form of The Lion King)
- Keira Knightley In A White Corset And Kate Beckinsale In A Black One (2005)
- Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle (1567)
- Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters (Millions of Years Ago) (3 PM) (1492)
- Shakespeare Makes Love (1998)
- Shakespeare meets the Pussycat Dolls (2009)
- Fox News (2000)
- Terminator (1984)
An Interesting Theory
Some people believe that an infinite amount of monkeys banging on an infinite amount of musical keyboards, given an infinite amount of time, would be able to produce Shakespeare's entire body of work. Because the Bush administration, however, cut all funding and support for anything monkey related (infuriating NASA ), neither the funding nor the space for a million monkeys have been readily available to prove the theory.
The University of Michigan, however, attempted to prove the theory using 126 monkeys, 14 undergraduate frat boys, and an Emoemo for seven and a half days in 2006 (the closest result as determined by a specially designed computer program). The experiment was an abject disaster as 12 of the frat boys started throwing feces at the monkeys, 49 of the monkeys refused type since they were PC not MAC simians , and the emo couldn't stop muttering how his life is an endless abyss of despair. Despite the failure, 112% of the University's science staff is confident that the theory will one day be confirmed.
Train-sexual Theory
A quite different theory has emerged which suggests Shakespeare was a train-sexual, a person who changes gender whilst on a train journey. Apparently Shakespeare would slip into the toilet to change clothes to transform from a man into a woman when he travelled to London and vice versa on the return trip back to Stratford Upon Avon. It may explain why Shakespeare has been praised for his feminine touches insightful depictions of women in his plays and sonnets. The double life of Shakespeare could explain his whereabouts during the 'missing decade' in the 1580s until he first came to public notice with the play Henry VI, a successful production that produced two sequels (Henry VI Part Two:The Red and White Rose Men and Henry VI Part Three:Collecting the Box Office Takings.)
Perhaps a more straight forward explanation was that Shakespeare had a sex change. It became quite stylish in this era where the men were as overdressed as the women and covered themselves in lipstick and perfume too. This would defiantly explain Shakespeare's 33-36-33 figure and also his well documented fits of bitchiness (which could now be attributed to his womanly period). Credible scholars have claimed that much of Shakespeare's imagery was rooted in the experience of menstruation. For example, Lady Macbeth's blood soaked hand as the artistic expression of the pain of menstruation, as Peter Gabriel's "Red Rain", U2's "Bloody Sunday", and Slayer's "Raining Blood" were all about their respective periods. Shakespeare was also a bad driver but very good at asking for directions.
Shakespeare's Sister Theory
A variation of 'William Shakespeare was a woman' theory is that put forward that all the writings attributed to him were actually done by his sister Siobhan Fahey-Shakespeare. Because this was an era of sexual and artistic repression, women were just expected to keep her man happy and to pop out babies until she died, it would have made sense for Siobhan to have used her brother's name to publish her work. However a study of handwriting and dress sizes now suggests that this was a lie.
In addition, it is now accepted that Siobhan did write a few plays that appear to be parodies of her brother's work. They include the Dirty Mind of King Lear, I Don't Care if you're Richard III and Hormonally Yours, Romeo and Juliet. However after Siobhan's death, these works were not performed and are now archived in a black box in the British Library where they keep all the rubbish-but-interesting works of literature.
Shakespeare was a "hack" Theory
Public school education focuses on long-dead poets and trigonometry but de-emphasizes things that are actually useful, like how to cheat on your taxes or identify a narc. This is why I know so much about William Shakespeare, literary icon and total hack.
It’s a major pain to talk like the guy because he wrote using “iambic pentameter,” which means “unnecessary apostrophes.” Let’s say you have to go to the bathroom. You can’t just say, “I have to go to the bathroom,” because that statement is surrounded by quotation marks. No, you’d have to say, “Verily, m’ bladd’r ars’t ‘bout t’ ‘xplode; O, won’t thou help’st me t’ thine t’e’r’l’e’t?” Of course, by the time you finish the sentence, it’s too late.
So who cares is Shakespeare contributed more than 1,700 words to the English language, including “eyeball,” “assassination,” “froing,” “ptowda,” “glorum” and “Shakespearean” ? But 1,700 words is less impressive than it sounds. More were invented per every episode of “The Osbournes.” Even if you excuse the writing, Shakespeare’s plays all still have the exact same ending, in which the main characters take turns killing each other in an overly elaborate manner. This gives them time to languish, mortally wounded, and speak in perfect poetic verse on how they’re about to expire.
Take “Romeo and Juliet.” Romeo, thinking Juliet has died, drinks poison; Juliet, who wakes to find Romeo unconscious, stabs herself. Then Romeo, who had confused poison with vodka, sees Juliet’s body and jumps off a bridge. Juliet, who had only nicked herself and passed out from the sight of blood, is so depressed that she jumps too, only to learn the creek running under the bridge is about four feet down. Finally alive and embracing, the lovers are tragically shot to death by Hamlet.
Not that Shakespeare’s plays were original in the first place. “Julius Caesar,” which the Bard went to his grave swearing had been his own invention, was later discovered to be the transcript of a 44 BC Roman Senate session. Also, “Romeo and Juliet” was a rip-off of “West Side Story.” Hamlet was obviously a rip of The Old Testament Of Teh Bible (though God sued and won big time).
To prove there’s nothing special about what Shakespeare did, I’ve created my own theatrical masterpiece. The Bard only wrote three different types, histories, tragedies and comedies, but my work encompasses all three. It’s called “MacBlago.” I already have a pretty solid ending, in which the main character is crushed by a falling children’s hospital. I think crowds will love it, provided MacBlago doesn’t return to haunt the talk show circuit.
Bibliography
- Much ADO about nothing - A treatise on social networking and other database connections. Published in 1999 in its unabridged form (12,523 pages) by Microsoft Press.
- The Hairy Wives Of Windsor - A comedy on the impossible task a fat knight - Windsor - is set to shave his many hairy wives in just three days. Often misheard as "The Merry Wives of Windsor".
- My Love Slave is Lost - The tale of a man's desperate search for his lost love-slave. Often misheard as "Love's Labour's Lost".
See also
- Britain
- Literature
- Shakespeare Authorship Debate
- Shakespeare's Poo Lit Soliloquy
- Thaddeus (nomenclature)
- What, you egg!
Notes
- ↑ Publishers are known to be very superstitious people.
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