Shakespeare operates at level of emotion and not reason

Continuing the focus on educators and their vision for our society, RCB invited Don Gardner, Principal B.D. Somani International School to talk about ‘Learnings from Shakespeare’. “400 years after his death, Shakespeare is still making a very positive influence all over the world. Like elsewhere, he has fans all over India too. Which is probably why, when I was sitting at the lunch table today, one gentleman remarked that, given today’s topic, I was wondering whether, to come or not to come?” Gardner gave the example of a pub in Australia which had a saying outside that read, ‘To drink or not to drink, what a stupid question.’

He illustrated how the old bard’s work has become a part of our daily lives in ways that we don’t consciously reflect on. People all over the world have adapted Shakespearean sayings into their daily lives more than we can imagine. Similar Shakespearean constructions that are in common use today include:

Break the Ice

It’s Greek to me

Naked truth

Melted into thin air

Too much of a good thing

Wild goose chase etc.

He likened the old bard’s works to climbing Mount Everest. “Understanding Shakespeare is a really difficult thing to do, but when you have done it, it’s exhilarating.”

Gardner who once made a 12 day Shakespearean walk from the latter’s birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon to the London Globe Theatre, takes selected students of B.D. Somani school every alternate year to England, to discover Shakespeare first hand at his birthplace. “It’s a measure of interest that Shakespeare can exert on a 15-16 year old, when you give them the opportunity to get interested.” said Gardner. 55 students of his school would voluntarily invest 9 days of their summer vacations to come to Stratford-upon-Avon to watch the plays based on the old bard’s works and meet actors of those plays and visit the home where Shakespeare was born, where his wife and mother lived. The directors of plays there, often try to take the text and see how it relates to present day society whether it’s the ideas of greed, money or what love is about or what it does to people?

Gardner claims he has been using the works of the old bard to try & raise the intellectual level of children attending his school. “The attempt is how can I make my students thinkers. What is characteristic of Shakespeare is that he never gives us answers on anything but instead asks a lot of questions,” said Gardner. This process of asking questions leads one to the answers.

“Shakespeare talks about what is relevant to us today. For example, take the opening lines of The Merchant of Venice – ‘I know not why I am so sad’. Now this is something all of us can relate to, as we have been sad at some time or the other,” Gardner elucidated. He said that though the old bard had only been to grammar school learning some Latin, little Greek and lots of rhetoric, he was a genius who could create an idea or an image using only words.

“In Shakespeare’s works, I have found something that I can study all my life and yet never understand and this is what gives me joy,” added Gardner.