Some critics have argued against the Oregon Shakespeare Festival\u27s contemporary English translation project, but Daniel Pollack-Pelzner argues it\u27s part of the process of keeping Shakespeare alive

Pollack-Pelzner, Daniel

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Linfield College DigitalCommons@Linfield Faculty Publications Faculty Scholarship & Creative Works 10-19-2015 Fresh Shakespeare from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival Daniel Pollack-Pelzner Linfield College, dpollack@linfield.edu Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/englfac_pubs  Part of the Dramatic Literature, Criticism and Theory Commons, Language Interpretation and Translation Commons, Literature in English, British Isles Commons, Playwriting Commons, and the Theatre History Commons DigitalCommons@Linfield Citation Pollack-Pelzner, Daniel, "Fresh Shakespeare from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival" (2015). Faculty Publications. Published Version. Submission 50. https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/englfac_pubs/50 This Published Version is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It is brought to you for free via open access, courtesy of DigitalCommons@Linfield, with permission from the rights-holder(s). Your use of this Published Version must comply with the Terms of Use for material posted in DigitalCommons@Linfield, or with other stated terms (such as a Creative Commons license) indicated in the record and/or on the work itself. For more information, or if you have questions about permitted uses, please contact digitalcommons@linfield.edu. Fresh Shakespeare from the OregonShakespeare FestivalCritics have argued against the festival's translation project, but it's part of the process of keeping Shakespeare aliveOctober 19, 2015 // CULTURE, THEATER // Oregon ArtsWatchBy DANIEL POLLACK-PELZNERWhen the Oregon Shakespeare Festival announced that it had commissioned 36 playwrights to translate all of Shakespeare’s plays into contemporary English, my inbox flooded. As a Shakespeare professor, I was expected to defend the purity of his language. “Aren’t you outraged?” one friend asked. Another demanded: “Isn’t there a law against this?”Here are my answers: there’s no law, and I’m not outraged. On the contrary, I think OSF’s project could be one of the most exciting things to happen to Shakespeare in years.Hitomi Manaka as Lavinia in Yukio Ninagawa’s 2006 Titus Andronicus(Taitasu Andoronikasu) at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre/”Lavinia –Ninagawa production” by Source (WP:NFCC#4). Licensed under Fairuse via Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Lavinia_-_Ninagawa_production.jpg#/media/File:Lavinia_-_Ninagawa_production.jpgLet me be clear: I love Shakespeare’s language. I relish its muscularity, its tenderness, its soaringlyricism, its intricate wit, its arresting directness. Would I trade, say, Juliet’s hurtling, longing line,“Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds, / Toward Phoebus’ lodging,” for the petulant No FearShakespeare translation: “I wish the sun would hurry up and set”? Never. There’s no fear of a sun-godallusion, but no trembling anticipation, either. If my students showed up in class with No FearShakespeare, I’d send them packing on a slow boat to Stratford.But I’m equally fascinated by the many ways that Shakespeare’s language has been renewed foraudiences around the world. The reason Shakespeare spread from a popular playwright on a small islandoff the northern coast of Europe to the most produced and beloved writer on the great globe itself is thathis works have been translated into nearly every modern language. The cultural reach of Britishimperialism accelerated the spread, but Shakespeare was embraced and adapted when the British werekicked out, and even non-English speaking countries delight in his works. New translations build newaudiences.In Germany, where “unser Shakespeare” (“our Shakespeare”) had become the most frequently stagedplaywright by the early twentieth century, a native writer hoped that if England lost the Great War, thepeace treaty would stipulate “the formal surrender of William Shakespeare to Germany.” Many othercultures have also claimed Shakespeare as their own. Our modern understanding of Shylock as asympathetic victim, rather than a comic villain, owes a great deal to his portrayal on the Yiddish stage.The first sound film version of “Hamlet” was made in Hindi and Urdu in 1935. In the early ’90s, therewere more Shakespeare productions in Tokyo than in London. And as Chancellor Gorkon claimed on“Star Trek”: “You have not experienced Shakespeare until you have read him in the original Klingon.”Yiddish theater changed our view of Shylock.“Shylock and Jessica,” Maurycy Gottlieb, oil oncanvas, 166.5 × 109.5 cmSince I can’t read Klingon, I don’t know how “Phoebus’ lodging” would be rendered, but in most otherlanguages, Shakespeare is translated into contemporary speech. That’s what OSF proposes to do forEnglish, too. The new translations are not intended to replace Shakespeare’s original scripts. Instead, thetranslations will form companion pieces—gateway drugs to hook a new generation of audiences andreaders.When I was younger, I would read a prosaic plot summary before seeing Shakespeare so that I couldfollow the story. Wouldn’t it be nice if kids had an option other than a plodding synopsis or No FearFakespeare to introduce them to the plays? OSF charges its playwrights to respect Shakespeare’s rhyme,rhythm, and metaphor in their updates, which could create scripts that help novices savor his style, notonly his (largely recycled) plots. Maybe your 10-year-old can read Shakespeare without help, but Icouldn’t, and I wish I’d had a savvy, stylish contemporary version to guide me.Beyond what the commission will do for audiences, think of what it will do for the 36 playwrights andtheir consulting dramaturgs—more than half of whom will be women and writers of color. Is there amore ambitious, inclusive project to support the diversity of theater artists working today? Writing in theNew York Times, Columbia professor James Shapiro said he wished that OSF had hired playwrights toproduce new shows like the Broadway smash “Hamilton” instead of updating Shakespeare. I’d love tosee more hits like “Hamilton,” but its creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, didn’t start his career with thatshow. Before “Hamilton,” he was commissioned to translate Stephen Sondheim’s lyrics to “West SideStory” into Spanish for a Broadway revival. (Sondheim, of course, had been hired in the 1950s to update“Romeo and Juliet.”) When I assign my students to translate a scene from Shakespeare intocontemporary English, it makes them read his language—each sound, each image, each reference, eachword choice—far more closely than they had before.The focus of Shakespeare’s own humanist education at his Stratford grammar school was on translatingLatin classics into the English of his day. Shakespeare went on to spend his career reworking earlierFrench and Italian and English sources into his plays. If we want to produce the next Miranda, or thenext Shakespeare, it might help to put a generation of playwrights through their translation trainingregimen. Gallop apace!Daniel Pollack-Pelzner teaches Shakespeare, Renaissance drama and British literary history at LinfieldCollege. His research focuses on Shakespeare adaptations—how writers have transformedShakespeare’s plots, characters and style into literary forms that speak to their own cultural moment.His most recent contribution to Oregon ArtsWatch was a four-part look at The Taming of the Shrewthat closely examined productions at Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the Portland ShakespeareProject.

Fresh Shakespeare from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival

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Fresh Shakespeare from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival

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