/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.20279536]

I have to accept that I will never be able to truly appreciate Shakespeare because I'm not an english native speaker, and his english is simply too difficult to fully comprehend for an ESL pleb. I tried to read him but I could hardly understand one fourth of the sentences. All the beauty is lost on me.

It doesn't matter how much I practice or study, the greatest writer in human history is forever beyond my grasp. And I can't do anything about it.

[Anonymous No.20279541]

>>20279536
stop posting cringe memes like this

[Anonymous No.20279550]

>>20279541
This is my life, faggot, not a meme. I'm really heartbroken about this. It doesn't feel fair.

[Anonymous No.20279551]

Joseph Conrad was a Pole but he mastered the English language, keep going.

[Anonymous No.20279570]

>>20279536
>t. monolingual angloid larper

[Anonymous No.20279571]

>>20279551
Thanks fren, but I already master contemporary english well enough to read english books as if they were in my native tongue. But Shakespeare's english is so old and different that I'm lost.

[Anonymous No.20279574]

>>20279536
Well the same is true of English native speakers with Corneille, Dante, or Cervantes. We have to cope somehow.

[Anonymous No.20279576]

>>20279570
Smettila di proiettare le tue insicurezze su di me, finocchio. Solo voi americani padroneggiate una sola lingua, anzi solo 0.8% di una lingua.

[Anonymous No.20279581]

>>20279574
Thank fuck I can at least read Dante and fully understand him.

[Anonymous No.20279587]

>>20279576
this nigga said “finocchio”

[Anonymous No.20279592]

>>20279587
Oooh shit! Call the teacher!

[Anonymous No.20279593]

>>20279536
Shakespeare is hard for most English speakers too. Just keep reading him and eventually you’ll get in a groove. One time I found that groove and read Julius Cesar and King Lear 2 times each in a week. It was a weird week for my internal voice

[Anonymous No.20279606]

>>20279592
Ihre einzige Möglichkeit ist, genug Deutsch zu lernen, um Schillers Übersetzungen zu lesen und dann so zu tun, als wären sie besser, finocchio

[Anonymous No.20279612]

>>20279536
why don't you just suck it up and become an ubermensch english speaker? fucking bitch ass pussy

on another note, I've seen some ESL people who speak impeccable English better than 99% of people who speak English as a first language (usually Germans for some reason)

[Anonymous No.20279620]

>>20279612
>for some reason
burger education at work

[Anonymous No.20279621]

>>20279570
he just said ESL, which means he's probably not American. seethe harder Jose.

[Anonymous No.20279628]

>>20279620
I know that english is a germanic language, you stupid fucking faggot, but french, as well as germanic languages other than german, also have a lot of overlap with english, but the best ESL speakers are still usually germans

[Anonymous No.20279638]

>>20279536
There are editions that have the original text on one page and a modern English paraphrase on the facing page. You could try that. Such things exist because he is difficult for native speakers as well.

[Anonymous No.20279657]

Just read it with a parallel translation so you can figure out the English and reverse engineer it

Then when you read it again later you'll know what everything means and be able to enjoy it. Nobody just reads Shakespeare once, real enjoyment comes from repeat readings.

[Anonymous No.20279669]

>>20279571
I’ll be honest with you OP I am a native English speaker and I couldn’t understand hamlet when I tried to read it years ago. It’s not just you it’s just a very difficult thing to read I think. We have a series of books called No Fear Shakespeare that is in modern English but I can vouch for it.

[Anonymous No.20279680]

>>20279612
The best english speakers I've ever met were ESL.
Americans in particular are fucking retarded. They're the only ones to make the "your-you're", "they're-their-there", "its-it's" mistakes. Every fucking time I see somebody making a grade schooler mistake like that, I just know it's a burger. Fucking illiterate mongoloids. You only master 0.8 of a language, how do you live with yourselves?

[Anonymous No.20279685]

>>20279606
Yeah, let's learn a third language so I can read the second one translated into the third.
This is why you cunts lost the war, faggots.

[Anonymous No.20279696]

>>20279638
Interesting. I'll look for one such edition, thanks.

>>20279593
I'll try, fren. Thank you for the encouragement.

[Anonymous No.20279703]

>>20279657
>>20279669
You guys are all so helpful and nice. Thanks frens. I will master the Master.

[Anonymous No.20279707]

>>20279680
I notice the same thing with French speakers. No one in my high school French classes confused the words "c'est" and "ces" but online french people consistently get them mixed up.

[Anonymous No.20279733]

>>20279707
Do they also whine when you point out their mistakes and insist that it doesn't matter because "they sound the same"?

I swear to Christ burgers are a fucking plague. So fucking stupid.

[Anonymous No.20279735]

>>20279536
English is my first language and half the time when I am reading Shakespeare I have no clue what he's saying either. Sometimes entire paragraphs of apparent gibberish will only be made sensible by one line that's reasonably relatable to modern English. It often genuinely feels like reading a different language, like how when I read German and can pick up on bits and pieces of words I know to get the gist of what is being said even though I don't actually speak German.

[Anonymous No.20279742]

>>20279703
What edition do you have? Most English natives read editions like Folger's which place definitions on half the pages, and the only versions which don't have these are very cheap printings for pocket books.

Everyone struggles with Shakespeare at first. Then your brain adjusts to his style and you start to love it. You get the urge to try and write stuff like Shakespeare, and then get disappointed that English doesn't let us write like that anymore.

[Anonymous No.20279796]

>>20279742
I have an Oxford Press "The Complete Works" edition from 1966 without a single goddamn footnote or explanation. Just raw text slapping your face like a whore being slapped by a cock.

[Anonymous No.20279836]

>>20279796
>I have an Oxford Press "The Complete Works" edition from 1966 without a single goddamn footnote or explanation.
Yeah, there's your problem.

[Anonymous No.20279854]

I'm an amerimutt and I could barely understand him in high school but he's no problem now. You can figure it out as long as you're motivated. Before you read a play try watching it performed on youtube.

[Anonymous No.20279860]

No native speaker understands Shakespeare either, retard.
His old English sounds pretty unnatural and ESL tier for us modern speakers.

[Anonymous No.20279953]

>>20279860
>he doesn't understand the Bard

[Anonymous No.20279962]

>>20279669
Never post on this board again

[Anonymous No.20279995]

Try watching the actual plays performed in recorded productions. There's at least one adaptation worth watching of every Shakespeare play on the Internet. Combined with subtitles, it makes 'em much easier to understand. Especially when watched multiple times through.

Failing that, I also recommend reading material from between Shakespeare and now. 19th and 18th Century material can help you acclimate.

[Anonymous No.20280418]

>>20279536
>This level of sensitiveness
You understood the story? Boom there you go.
Even if you are
>an english native speaker,
You still
>not truly appreciate Shakespeare
because He lived 500 fucking years ago and language was different back then

[Anonymous No.20280567]

>>20279536
They're plays, watch them, don't read them, if your Early Modern English isn't up to snuff. They'll be much easier to understand once ensouled by the actors and stage.

[Anonymous No.20280583]

>>20279536
>I have to accept that I will never be able to truly appreciate Shakespeare because I'm not an english native speaker
100% true but so what? Read your own poets and novelists. What resonates most with us, what feels most poetic, are the words that we've built up so many associations with throughout our lives. Become a master of your own tongue and your own literature, stop worshipping what isn't made for you.

[Anonymous No.20280585]

Shakespeare is best enjoyed as a groundling while sitting outside on the grass and drinking.

I once almost got thrown out of a performance of Richard III because I was shitfaced and couldn't stop reciting lines along with the play.

[Anonymous No.20280612]

>>20279536
Did you know that if you do something that is incomprehensible to you, and seems only like noise, repetitively and often, in spite of it seeming incomprehensible and like noise, you will eventually pick up the subtleties of the thing in question, and be able to interpret its motions or textures or noise, into a properly comprehensible system? Consider it with anything. Geometric or scientific nomenclature, mechanically complex games, or a cultural umbrella with its subcultural distinctions or fineries that are all but obvious to the uninitiated. Each of these things only require "exposure therapy" to acclimate to and begin building a piecemeal knowledge of over a period of time to achieve fluency or mastery. So why not a type of language that is about 75% the same as a language you already know? You basically have your entire leg and hip in the door already.

[Anonymous No.20280616]

>>20279581
Is the really The Poet in capital letters?

[Anonymous No.20280620]

>>20279593
I'll pray to attain this level of yours.

[Anonymous No.20280624]

>>20279953
yeah this is a cope. if youre esl, its ok to have the side by side translation though.

[Anonymous No.20280738]

>>20279669
>No Fear Shakespeare
Do anglos really?

[Anonymous No.20280868]

i don't get it, as an ESL Shakespeare is perfectly comprehensible
post an excerpt that is hard to understand

[Anonymous No.20280885]

>>20279536
Use a heavily footnoted edition. Arden is great.

I'm a native English speaker who reads a fair amount of 16th century literature and much of Shakespeare is too difficult for me to properly understand without footnotes either. His syntax, density and breadth of references stand out even among his contemporaries.

[Anonymous No.20281335]

>>20279536
I'm not an angloid, and with patience I can read him. It is not impossible, just hard if you can't extract meaning from long sentences, full of suborditate clauses. If this is the case, you most likely can't do it in your own language either.

[Anonymous No.20281385]

>>20280418
>You understood the story? Boom there you go.
By this logic, reading the wikipedia page about his plays is the same as reading the plays themselves.

The level of this board has really plummeted in recent years.

[Anonymous No.20281395]

>>20280616
He's bloody amazing, yes. A pity our schools ruin him by forcing 13-18 year olds to read him when they're neither prepared nor interested in him, so he gets permanently associated with boredom and coercion by imbecilic authority figures.

[Anonymous No.20281398]

>>20279536
Just read it again, stop acting like a pussy.

[Anonymous No.20281399]

>>20280868
>why yes, even though I'm an ESL I perfectly understand even the nuances of an author who lived centuries ago and wrote in a now obsolete version of english that even native speakers have trouble with.
You don't sound cool when you say shit like this. You sound like the little lying tryhard that you actually are.

[Anonymous No.20281417]

>>20279574
Learning French well enough to know whether or not French literature is all it's cracked up to be is one of my main goals in life

[Anonymous No.20281422]

>>20279536
Meh, it's the same with North Americans and the greatest literature in other languages. We probably get better translations, I dunno, but you at least have a better chance of reading Shakespeare in English than I do of fully appreciating Dante in Italian or what have you.

[Anonymous No.20281456]

>>20281399
why are you so insecure? it's a genuine question with no pretension because i don't have an inferiority complex and Shakespeare's English is perfectly comprehensible. Clearly you couldn't post a single excerpt.

[Anonymous No.20281535]

you are fucking dumb
if you can't appreciate it, how do you know it's the best writer in human history? doesn't make fucking sense you dumbass

[Anonymous No.20281567]

>>20279536
I’m struggling through a book by Céline, there’s no way I could ever read Molière.

[Anonymous No.20281568]

>>20281456
Nta, but if Shakespeare is so easy to understand, why is he so studied, and why are there so many different interpretations?

[Anonymous No.20281600]

>>20279536
Disregard everything that is said in this thread and hear me speak but this:
It's not about comprehending the language, but letting it apprehend you. It's also not meant to be read, but watched and listened to. If you want to read through it, I suggest reading along with one of the old radio recordings (the old bbc ones tend to be decent) and focus on how they're saying things as opposed to understanding exactly what they're saying.

[Anonymous No.20281611]

>>20279536
Just read him with a translator. There are dozens of editions of Shakespeare where they translate him on the opposite page. Then, when you understand it, read him through without the translation and be transported by his beauty. Don’t give up anon! The brain is a plastic thing and you can achieve anything with diligence.

[Anonymous No.20281696]

>>20281568
All good poetry, modern or otherwise, needs studying and is hard to interpret. We were talking about the diction being supposedly incomprehensible for ESLs

[Anonymous No.20281736]

>>20281696
The words themselves are usually similar. The fact that Shakespeare is poetry in a play makes him difficult to read if you don’t read poetry, plays, or are unfamiliar with archaic terms/expressions/cultural norms/etc. The English language has changed a lot over 400+ years. Shakespeare is a writer where you take away as much as you put in. I wouldn’t describe him as easy though. If you think he is and you’re ESL, you probably don’t find any literature hard and you’re probably a savant

[Anonymous No.20281757]

>>20279536
Most native speakers don't truly appreciate Shakespeare. By attempting you're halfway there arguably.
Try using a lightly annotated version like Folgers. Something that will define archaic words and clarify odd phrases but won't interpret the thing for you. Re-read the plays, once to get the plot and once to get the subtleties--but if you find yourself getting bored by doing this just move on to the next one. Also binge multiple plays in a row, once you get used to his language in one of them you get better at reading it in another one. I did this last winter and read like 10 of them, hardly had a better reading experience in my life.

[Anonymous No.20281809]

>>20281456
>somebody exposed by posturing
>quick, call him insecure!
>crisis averted.

[Anonymous No.20281822]

>>20281757
>Also binge multiple plays in a row, once you get used to his language in one of them you get better at reading it in another one. I did this last winter and read like 10 of them, hardly had a better reading experience in my life.
This is good advice. After you read a few the barrier really breaks down and it becomes awesome

[Anonymous No.20282879]

>>20279536
Just read, bro. Read out loud until your throat sores.