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/lit/ - Literature

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6942456 No.6942456 [Reply] [Original]

If Shakespeare was alive today, would he write plays, screenplays, big American novels, or nothing at all?

>> No.6942472

>>6942456
>big American novels
He wasn't American, you stupid fuck.

>> No.6942475

He wouldn't be the same person: his up bringing would be different; he wouldn't be called shakespeare; he would have different education etcetera

>> No.6942476

>>6942472
Thanks for the clarification.

>> No.6942481

>>6942472
if he was alive today you know he would take a teaching post at Yale and then like do occasional consulting for Hollywood, and also make guest appearances on CNN etc, so he would be like basically an American

>> No.6942482
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6942482

You asked for this.

>> No.6942483
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6942483

>>6942472

>> No.6942485

>>6942475
I mean, if he was still alive today (451 years old) like your average Biblical character

>> No.6942488

>>6942472
but he spoke and wrote in American?

>> No.6942508

He'd write blockbuster movies with lots of explosions.

He was just the Elizabethan Michael Bay.

>> No.6942514

>>6942456
He'd write comic books, you daft cunt. American comic books. Maybe fumetti.

>>6942472
>He wasn't American
smh

>> No.6942517

>>6942475
he'd be Jayden Smith tbh

>> No.6942554

>>6942472
If we are imagining him alive its not too much of a bunch to imagine him immigrating to a new country and starting up a new life

>> No.6942558

>>6942514
fellini pls go

>> No.6942605

He'd have his own Youtube channel where he plays hilarious pranks on unsuspecting people in Los Angeles.

>> No.6942702

The modern equivalent of theater would be screenplays, so I guess he'd do that.

>> No.6942914

This type of hypothetical is dumb because it suggests that the smartest, most creative people now work in the new mediums, which isnt true.

X artist would be working in video games, X composer would be a DJ, X playwright would be a screenwriter.

No. There is still a hierarchy.

for writers: poetry, drama, prose......film/tv

>> No.6942991

>>6942456
if shakespeare was alive today he wouldn't be shakespeare

>> No.6942996
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6942996

>>6942456
>nothing at all

>> No.6943015

>>6942914
I don't know if Shakespeare really cared about the "hierarchy". He was a money maker, he wrote plays because it was profitable.

>> No.6943072

>>6943015
Yeah so maybe in that regard you could argue he'd create films, but he is just a stand-in for this tired hypothetical which asserts modern high culture is no longer produced by the cream of the crop

>> No.6943081

>>6942456
Poetry for fun, screenplays for money.

>> No.6943106

>>6942508
Nice meme. Would you be interested in explaining how Shakespeare is like Michael Bay?

>> No.6943137

>>6943072
But there is some truth to this, because the highest forms of art (opera, poetry...) have a sparse public today: some scholars, broke artsy types, and that's it. That is, if your work isn't considered "retrograde" by the critics.

Even if you're a true master in your art, even if you get connoisseur approval, you will only receive low income and low recognition (unlike the pre-modern era) for your huge efforts. You're basically wasting your time.

Being the best poet of all times, in 2015? To sell 200 books in your native language and be instantly ignored or forgotten? To keep on being a poor faggot? It's just not worth it. Better become a filmmaker, or an investment banker.

>> No.6943878

Soap operas and sitcoms

>> No.6943903

>>6942456
Monologues are kind of his thing.
If he did films they would have heavy narration.

Modern theatre would leave him understimulated. He liked events to happen.
Could see him as a Dostoevskian novelist instead.

>> No.6943920

>>6942456

>write a script for a historical play
>everyone rejects it because it's not diverse enough and doesn't depict George III as a black woman or something
>tries to write a comedy
>someone spreads cherrypicked lines from Taming of the Shrew and Merchant of Venice all over social media, everyone writes him off as an evil patriarchal white man without reading it
>starts to write poety in a backwater blog instead
>gets zero page hits
>starts drinking heavily
>ends up divorced and posting incoherently on /pol/ about the illuminati

>> No.6943951

>>6942456
he'd see this thread and an hero

>> No.6943971

he would write dialogue for highly acclaimed television dramas.

>> No.6944041

he'd write rap music.

>> No.6944662

>>6943081
This tbh

>> No.6944680

>>6944662
If he was alive...he'd change his name to fucking Francis bacon. Because there was no such thing as will Shakespeare. Wake up..

>> No.6944705

>>6943137
>Being the best poet of all times, in 2015? To sell 200 books in your native language and be instantly ignored or forgotten? To keep on being a poor faggot? It's just not worth it. Better become a filmmaker, or an investment banker.

That depends on how do you see things. If you have a job and still have plenty of time and energy to write, why simply don't put the effort into creating something you really think has merit and worth?

If you already have a good job and earn money to live a decent life you can make use of your creativity in anything you want.

And that doesn't mean you are going to produce things that nobody care for: The Shakespeare Globe Theater earns a lot of money per year, and Broadway theaters are very prosperous.

Who knows what a new and bold playwright may achieve? Look at this fellow: he created a blank verse plays about Prince Charles that was highly successful:

http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/sep/20/king-charles-iii-mike-bartlett

http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/sep/12/king-charles-iii-review-shakespeare-mike-bartlett-wyndhams-tim-pigott-smith

You are throwing the towel even before the start of the fight.

>> No.6945109

>>6944705
>a blank verse plays about Prince Charles that was highly successful
Funny and quirky, but judging by the excerpts, it's very bad poetry. All fluff and marketing, no substance. Meanwhile, very high achievements in poetry could be overshadowed by this kind of "funny" stuff who attracts all the attention.

Also that's in English. Good luck to get recognition if you're the greatest poet in Romanian or Malayalam language (or even in Italian or Portuguese).

>If you already have a good job and earn money to live a decent life...
Then you're just too tired to write. Shakespeare, Homer or Victor Hugo didn't have a 9-5 job. Part-time genius doesn't exist.

>> No.6945235

>>6945109

Ok, so give up.

But there are still a lot of people in history who defied everything that you pointed out (and even more) and achieved great things. If you really are great you are not going to let circumstances let you down. Are there a lot of people who would not flourish unless they were in the exact environment? Yes, there are. But there are other people, rarer, stronger, that will face several hardships and simply not give up, and they are the ones who make history.

>> No.6945259

>>6945235
u mean handful

>> No.6945280

>>6945259

Fame and merit are not the same thing, not even close. There are a lot of great artists and scientists that you haven't heard off (and probably never will), but they know themselves, deep down, what they are worth.

>> No.6945284

>>6945109
>Funny and quirky, but judging by the excerpts, it's very bad poetry. All fluff and marketing, no substance.

Yeah, but his case only shows that there is potential. Imagine if the same play was written but with greater poetry?