Henry Redux

Well, I'm at the halfway point of Henry IV part II. I must say, after a three-week layoff from Willie the Shake, I'm really, really enjoying it. Moreso than I would have even thought three months ago, let alone a year back.

I mean, take in the sheer poetry of these lines:

In poison there is physic, and these news,
Having been well, that would have made me sick,
Being sick, have in some measure made me well.

What they mean, I'm not sure, but over them I've gone at least a dozen times attempting to unravel that knot. To me it's the literary equivalent of one of them funhouse mirror-mazes, one you go through while your in some sorta fever dream.

And Falstaff is back, too, Shakespeare's greatest creation. Listen:


CHIEF JUSTICE: Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great infamy.

FALSTAFF: He that buckles himself in my belt cannot live in less.

CHIEF JUSTICE: Your means are very slender, and your waste is great.

FALSTAFF: I would it were otherwise. I would my means were greater and my waist slender.


It's like Mel Brooks directing a scene penned by Frasier's writers. With apologies to the greatest writer in English, I don't think the analogy is too far off the mark.

After this, I tackle Lear. And after that, a comedy, Measure for Measure.

Tarry on!