I just discovered this delightful stop-motion movie made out of Legos (no, not that movie…this five-minute short about Shakespeare).
Wags may prefer calling it The Ultimate Battle of Wills (cough). Just call it “educational” and enjoy a good laugh while marveling at the infinite ingenuity of your fellow human kind.
Or maybe these folks just have too much time on their hands.
Either way, keep it up, guys.
UPDATE: The embedded viewer has been disabled by YouTube. The video now requires a link but will prove worth the extra click. My apologies.
While I process all the happenings this weekend at the 2014 California International Antiquarian Book Fair, I thought you might enjoy this video (recommended to me by YouTube…they’re learning!) explaining in great detail the recent quest to recover Richard III’s body from a Leicester parking lot.
A part of me, quite honestly, resists this type of slick, made-for-TV production. Yet I can’t help but be thankful that the truth, for Richard’s sake, whatever it turns out to be, gets made known to a wide, general audience. He deserves nothing less.
As a recently-published review of Shakespeare’s Richard III suggests, the time may not be far off when theatergoers demand a more nuanced treatment than the typical, over-the-top, Richard-as-evil-henchman performances we have grown accustomed to. What that would look like is anybody’s guess.
It opens up a conundrum, welcome or not, regarding the desirability of absolute fidelity to an author’s intent, even when history discovers the basis for that intent to be patently false. The text will always remain the text [text qua text]. But in light of these events, one might reasonably ask if that should always be the case.
Perhaps Richard III’s lasting legacy will be as another lesson in how a lie told often enough – and well enough – can, over time, be taken for truth. And that also, just maybe, given enough time, the actual truth will eventually out.
History could be in the midst of radical revision right in front of our very eyes.
Only slightly belated, but not because I wasn’t thinking of you, dear readers. I slipped away to the ocean for a few days free from the internet and cell phones, soaking up the spring sunshine and recharging for the Sonnets ahead. (I know, spring sunshine sounds premature, but it was lovely shorts-and-tank-top weather on the California coast. It’s rough, I grant that, especially for those of you blanketed by snow on the East Coast of the United States. But hey — I’d trade LA for NY or Dublin or Budapest or St. Petersburg on almost any other occasion… but not when girls emerge from their wintry cocoons as fluttering butterflies in their summer dresses.)
I hope you too enjoyed time far from the madding crowd.
Now that I’m back, I wanted you to know that you were missed. Here’s a small token of my appreciation. I won’t mention who it’s by, for fear it will get yanked by the embedding police. But it’s a great song by a band I’ve adored since the moment their first album came out. Storm in Heaven will always be one of my favorites!
Appropriate for our task ahead, but also to celebrate a day we set aside to honor love.
Here ya go. I hope it will get to stay up! If not, I’ll try and find an alternative take.
For those of you who missed the obscure reference in the last post, or were born in a year vaguely recognizable to either current Playboy Playmates or NHL wunderkinds (wunderkinder?) who are destined to end up together eventually anyway, here’s video evidence that a beloved childhood series (for me) actually existed. What would we do without youtube?
Now… has anybody got a spare Space Food Stick stashed away in a timecapsule somewhere?
While I’m busy catching up on all the Pericles I’ve been putting off (today’s gonna hurt), I thought I’d find you kids a few distractions to keep you entertained. Enjoy… for now.
“To be or not to be… that is the question.”
“Yeah!”
Flat out clever… and funny.
Brett Favre has a second career waiting for him… should he never retire.
It was by far my favorite ad during the Super Bowl this year. As it turns out (and it figures) Google has been running it for quite awhile on YouTube.
But I certainly hadn’t seen it before. To show you what a sap I am, I utterly adored it. Telling a story through a series of Google queries seemed not only heartfelt and witty in comparison to all the lame beer commercials and jock humor, but also the most thematically spot on: search after all is what Google is about.
Houses made out of Bud Lite, coffins filled with Doritos? I didn’t just dislike those — I hated them. Ick.
Here is the Google ad, in case you missed it. Enjoy!
Enough seriousness. Now for a bit of silliness. Good times! These guys are wicked talented.
A Year of Shakespeare 