Some Wisdom from the Emerald Isle



Jules took the photo in Dublin. So very, very true.

Dance went well, despite some...unforeseen curiosities. Drama begins Monday night. Watched the fast-forwarded version of Stage Beauty with Mum, Jules and Pete today - the latter two of which are studying Othello (Jules for official college course; Peter for unofficial vicarious college course in homeschooling high school). Movie made all the more interesting for having seen the Abbey Theatre's all-male cast of The Importance of Being Earnest last month. (See picture right.)

At breakfast discussed whether the Macbeths ever truly loved each other, why the Early Church can't quite be called a form of Communism but perhaps of Distributionism, and the Muppets' take on both. (In Pete's words: It's time to write a Manifesto! It's time to kill a King!) Ye olde merrie typical Saturday morning for the Snyder family!

Was supposed to see The Last Kiss today for trailer checks, but Johnny ended up taking my place, which was just as well. So instead I betook me to Borders' Cafe (whatever it's being called this week), where I bought a journal (having left mine at home - and it's such a pretty journal!) and then took out my copy of Macbeth (which I had taken with me), read through the surprisingly good literary criticism at the end, taking notes and underlining as I went, flipping through the standard editor explanations at the beginning, and then reading the first two acts and thinking about how to stage the whole thingummy. My brain keeps coming back to something resembling Ian McKellan's take on Richard III which set that despotic regime in a Hitleresque world. Perhaps it's because Hitler and his dancing browncoats remain such a vivid image of pure evil in our times that the language of his imagery remains so potent on-stage as well. Or perhaps I'm simply eager to rip-off the images I saw of Sean Bean's Macbeth (although looking more closely at the pictures it looks all a little plastic - I prefer my dictators to seem a bit more lived-in... ;P).

Am finishing up "Rogue and Peasant Slave" before I pop in Olivier's As You Like It and finish grading essays. The Jack Sparrow chair has apparently found the rum, making it entirely impossible to sit in. Johnny thinks that the letters in the Beatrice Letters by that infuriating but tantalizing - a word here which means money-making - Lemony Snicket, spells out "Beatrice Snake" but the conspiracy theorists over on Wikipedia beg to differ. In greater news, the official Lemony Snicket site declares that The Gothic Archies are releasing an album featuring all their music for the Unfortunate Events on one CD to coincide with the release of the 13th book, The End (a fitting if non-alliterative title). I am MORE than thrilled that the Count Olaf song will be on the CD!!! Hurrah hurrah!

Anywho - miles to go before I sleep. Alles gut. To finish with A. A. Milne:

Christopher Robin: Will you promise to never forget me, Pooh? Even when I'm a hundred?

Pooh: How old will I be then?

Christopher Robin: Ninety-nine.

Mood: Pas mal, inching towards heureux
Music: "Creating Governing Dynamics" from A Beautiful Mind
Thought: Tiddely-pom
Oh, and in case you missed it: The poster for the latest play is to the left. In larger size and sans dates (Nov. 17 & 18 at 7 p.m. at HCH), behold the one-sheet for The Seven Ages of Man.