The Shakespeare Challenge

“Oh, what fools these mortals be!”
(A Midsummer Night’s Dream)

Shakespeare. With most, he’s either loved, or he’s hated. It’s rare for me to meet anyone who is in the “in-between” zone. Many people had to (or is having to) read at least one Shakespeare play in high school. Likely Romeo and Juliet, the usual assignment. For me, I had to read three Shakespeare plays, plus sonnets. I was in advanced and extra-curricular English and Lit courses, so there was a lot of assigned reading. I was rather thankful for it, actually. If it hadn’t been for the courses, I would have taken probably much longer to pick up many of the favorite classics I love today, if ever at all.

Anyways, yes, Romeo and Juliet was one of them. I had an advantage, though. I had already read it before the assignment. I read it when I was thirteen. Why? Just for fun. I found the book one day among a box of books that my mom and I had bought from a garage sale for me. I already knew about William Shakespeare. I grew up with a lot of literature around me so it wasn’t something entirely new, it was just something that I hadn’t read and I was insanely curious as to what made this man so famous for so many centuries.

It wasn’t long before I fell completely head over heels. I was already writing my own work, and as I looked it over, I felt this sudden desire to hopefully be able to have the same kind of emotional impact on my own readers one day as well. And yet, poor William Shakespeare, never truly knew the amazing impact his work has had on so many readers. It’s a tragedy in itself.

After reading, and then reading more from school assignments, I became a bit obsessed to say the least. I began collecting all I could and reading more.

The last week or two, I’ve had this great desire to go through my collection and start picking through his work. Again. Every so often, I do this. I own his entire collection, so of course, it’s no trouble. I can pick up anything I want, anytime. I’m telling you, I’m a huge fan girl. If Will was alive today, it wouldn’t do for him to be on any social network like Twitter or Facebook, because I’d probably get in trouble for being a creepy stalker.

So, I’ve had a bit of a reading/blog hop challenge in mind.

Here are some thoughts and ideas behind it:

From now until April 23rd (Shakespeare’s recorded birthday), every Tuesday, anyone who is participating, will make a post in relation to Shakespeare. Quotes, reviews, pictures, art, character fun (chat with the character, etc.), giveaways, writing exercises of your own that are inspired by Shakespeare or use a Shakespearean character, or stop on by the blog and see if I have a question/trivia for you to answer.

If you’re participating, please leave a link in the comments of the posts so that we can all visit each other. If more people start joining up, I’ll use the linky system instead. Also feel free to take the button I’ve created and use it if you’re participating as well. Just link back to my blog is all I ask!

If this is something that may interest you, let me know. If it doesn’t generate enough interest, then I’ll just forget about the challenge and discard it. No worries. Just tossing the idea out there, anyway. ;)

Thanks!