Shakespeare speaks English?

Pellucid (adj): clear in meaning, expression, or style; clear or limpid.

I always get angry when I hear people insult Shakespeare--his is one of my greatest idols because of the things he was able to accomplish during and after his lifetime. During the drama part of an English course, it is inevitable for me to hear these insults: "Why does he have to use such hard words?" "These characters are so freaking stupid!" "Reading this is pointless. I'm just going to use Sparknotes."

I understand that people don't understand him, but why wouldn't you want to learn how to? His writing is no harder to comprehend than Chaucer or Donne if you just practice. The more you read of Shakespeare, the more you'll understand without having to look at the footnotes. Okay, I've been reading Shakespeare since fifth grade, so I'm used to him by now--but do you really think that I understood him back then? No way. Heck, I still don't understand him all the way, and I've been reading his plays for seven years.

Take the simple phrase from Romeo and Juliet (my feelings about R&J are not being revealed because I'll probably be murdered.) that may be one of the most famous lines from the tragedy: "Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father, and refuse thy name..." (If you watch John Green's videos, then you've heard this recently). Close reading of Juliet's line will reveal what it actually means. 

Many people believe that this line means "Where are you, Romeo?" when it fact it means "What is the purpose of being Romeo?" Why are you a Montague, my father's enemy? If you interpret the line correctly, the rest of the speech falls into place: Why are you Romeo? Refuse the name of Montague. If you do not, I shall deny my own family for your sake.

See what happens you actually analyze and take Shakespeare apart? It's so much easier to understand! Let's try this sentence from Hamlet and see if you can pick it into pieces.

Who would fardels bear,

To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscovered country from whose bourn

No traveler returns, puzzles the will

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

The first step is to go line by line and look up any words you do not know. There is absolutely no embarrassment in using a dictionary! Go through and make sure you know the meaning of every unknown word. Without the correct definition, it will be difficult to understand the meaning of the piece as a whole. 

Which words did you have to look up? I know that I had to look up fardels; it's definitely not a word you hear colloquially (in modern language)! (Hey, look! Another vocab word of the day for you. You're welcome.)

The next thing to do is "translate" one line at a time. It certainly seems like you have to translate Shakespeare into modern English to even begin to understand it, doesn't it? Here's my version of the speech:

Who would bear the burden

Of grunting and sweating in an exhausting life

unless they feared something after death,

the unknown country from whose borders

No one returns, which confuses the mind

And makes us deal with the evils we know

Rather than seek the ones we do not?

Look, modern English! That wasn't too bad, was it? Dissecting Shakespeare is the second step to knowing what the heck is going on.

The next step is to look at the situation as a whole. This question came from Hamlet's most famous soliloquy from Act 3, Scene 1 of the play ("To be or not to be; that is the question:..). Look at the speech. What is happening? What is the character talking about when he or she is speaking?

Once you've established the soliloquy's meaning, look at the scene next. What has happened that prompted this revelation? Who was involved? What is their relationship to the character?

The last way to understand the meaning of the speech is to examine the relationship between the soliloquy and the work as a whole. What was Shakespeare's overall purpose of writing this soliloquy? How did it impact the decisions the character made, and how did those decisions change the outcome of the play? Did the style of the speech change the meaning?

Think over these questions whenever you are confronted with something as daunting as one of the best writers to ever live. You'll eventually find that, as hard as it may have been in the beginning, the writing is actually quite pellucid after practice.