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with Subtext: Using Groucho to Teach Shakespeare
By John S. O'Connor When confronted with these lines last year, one group of highly proficient freshmen concluded that "The king was happy to stay with the Macbeths, and Lady Macbeth was happy to have him." My students were, of course, correct on the surface; however, their reading completely ignores Lady Macbeth's sinister subtext. Students did not consider the context of the lines (her opening soliloquy in 1.5, for example); her desires and goals; her husband's ambition and her ambition for Macbeth.Duncan I wanted my students to read the subtext of the lines -- to imagine what characters are thinking as they are saying their lines. This, afterall, is where much of the ambiguity lies, and one of the reasons why the plays are still performed so often. The excellent Shakespeare Set Free series provided some fine exercises to get students to begin considering subtext, but I think I really began teaching students to read for subtext after I saw an old Marx Brothers movie on television. In Animal Crackers, Groucho Marx considers marriage proposals from two socialites whom he despises. Unable to speak his true thoughts in front of the ladies, Groucho politley excuses himself from the conversation, saying to both women, "Pardon me while I have a strange interlude." Suddenly the ladies go out of focus and Groucho steps up to the camera to deliver a brief monolgue: "Why you couple of baboons! What makes you think I'd marry either of you?" Groucho returns to the scene, neither woman having heard Groucho's true feelings from the "interlude." Groucho's interlude provides an unmistakable idea of his feelings toward the women: he likes neither woman (except, perhaps, for their money). However, the same scene -- without the interlude -- would remain ambiguous. Is Groucho afraid? Is he proposing bigamy ("It's big of all of us," he later says)? Is he uncertain which woman he prefers? Groucho's editorial insert represents his true feelings, the sub-text in the scene, which he cannot reveal in front of the ladies without ruining his chances of marrying money.Groucho The search for subtext is very difficult for most students of Shakespeare -- and for good reason. Shakespeare's characters, unlike Groucho's, are multi-faceted; their motivations are not always clear to scholars (let alone to high school students) and their actions are often motivated by many forces at once: loyalty, society, power, family, ambition, love, etc.. Furthermore, it is more difficult to discern subtext when reading than when seeing an actor perform since the actor's facial expressions, gestures and vocal inflections help draw subtextual material to the surface. Having no Groucho to interrupt and comment on the scene, students often take speakers' words at face value without considering what a character is thinking while saying his lines or while other characters are speaking to him. Short of resurrecting Groucho, I introduce students to the idea of subtext by briefly performing the Groucho scene above. I then ask students to perform short improv skits in which they must say express different ideas from the ones they are feeling: parents who hate the date their child has brough home; an employee who tells his boss he appreciates the thorough critique he received on a recent evaluation. I give students 5-10 minutes to consider 1) the social context of the scene, 2) their character's goals, 3) the character's desires, and 4) the obstacles which stand in the way of these goals and desires. Even with this scant preparation, their improvised scenes already begin to display an undercurrent of tension between the characters' words and thoughts. I then select a scene we are reading which is especially rich in sub-text, and have volunteers read the scene aloud without interruption. I give students about 10 or 15 minutes to re-read their lines and to consider the same four steps mentioned above. This time, however, I add a very important fifth item: context within the play (i.e. the scenes immediately before and after the scene at hand). If this task seems too daunting to any one student, or if you want to make sure the whole class is involved, form the class into groups of four or five, each group considering one character in the scene. Each group selects one person to perform the scene, but every group member can suggest subtextual meaning for the character they are considering. In fact, if time permits, each member can perform a different subtextual reading of the same lines. This is a nice way to reinforce the idea that multiple "right" readings are possible as long as they are supported by the text. Consider an example from Macbeth: (3.1.19-41). Many students read this scene as an innocent conversation between Banquo and Macbeth about their dinner plans, without considering Macbeth's insidious subtext. After considering why they are saying these lines (Again I use the five steps mentioned above: social and dramatic context, goals, desires and obstacles), students always ask themselves questions like these: How does Macbeth feel about Banquo's riding plans? Does he see it as an ideal opportuing to murder him? An obstacle to a clean murder? When does Banquo first suspect Macbeth's murderous motives? Here is how one class performed the scene: While this reading was interrupted after nearly every speech, these students did a great job exploring the motives and ambitions of the characters which lie beneath the surface of their words. I was not at all bothered by Macbeth's interruption in the middle of his second speech, Banquo's long comment on his short last speech, or by the equicidal joke which concludes the scene. All I care about is that students seriously examine the motivations of characters.Macbeth Best of all, these asides almost always spark controversy--actors quibbling with other actors' readings of lines and editorial decisions. For example, one group wanted to know why Macbeth would want Banquo and Fleance murdered away from Forres. Afterall, he killed Duncan in his own home. Also, as king now, why would Macbeth be afraid of people knowing he killed them? There are good reasons, of course. One group noted that Macbeth's fear and insecurity are among the biggest obstaces to his reign. Using the dramatic context, another group pointed out that Macbeth's power is tenuous and in the scene immediately after Banquo's exit, Macbeth talks with the murderers about the assassination at the palace gate. One group challenged Banquo's aside after his last speech. Why would he speak about Malcolm and Donalbain before speaking of his own son? Does he really care more for them than for Fleance? The Macbeth group defended their last aside as more than a joke. They said they wanted to show that Macbeth had already gone over the edge by this point in the play and could no longer harness his murderous ambition. Another scene which worked nicely is Romeo and Juliet 4.1.15-43. Here is a truncated transcript of this scene as my students performed it in class. Here, again, interesting subtextual issues surface when characters make their inner feelings explicit to the audience. For example, the Friar's opening comment here exposes his willing meddlesomeness. One student suggested that the Friar seems to be playing God--an idea which takes on life and death significance by the play's end. Students fought over Paris's motives: Does he truly love Juliet? Why else would he marry her? Exploring this issue here makes Paris's fight with Romeo in the churchyard take on greater significance in Act V. Both men are ready to die for the woman they love. Students also fought over Juliet's remark. Is she thinking of fooling Paris here, or are her thoughts totally outside of this scene, focused solely on Romeo?Friar [Aside] I encourage different students or different groups to perform the same scenes and to make cases for their readings of the lines. Students not only excavate a wealth of subtextual material performing these exercises, but they also begin to feel the elasticity of the words, to appreciate how different readings of the same lines can be supported by the text. It is important to perform the scene a final time without additional asides. This forces students to work as actors: to use their voice, movement, stage positioning and gestures to convey the subtext of the lines. These exercises not only make students better actors, they also make students better spectators. Later in the quarter, as we looked at comparative video segments of different Macbeth productions, and as we watched live performances by local actors, students looked for the subtext in the ways in which actors performed their lines. Using Groucho Marx to explore Shakespeare's plays may seem iconoclastic, but these exercises forced students to attend to the language much more carefully than they did before. Equally important when studying a play: we had fun.
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16, 1999.
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