greenspeare-blog
ELU 2017: Green Shakespeare
WHO ARE WE? 7 students from Tallinn University working on a project called Green Shakespeare, that connects Shakespeare and nature WHAT IS THAT? Something to do with a mysterious thing called ELU WHAT IS GOING TO BE HAPPENING? We’re going to be making a few posts every week, all pertaining to the theme of “Green Shakespeare”. Any material we will be using will have links to the original source, and every post will have the name of its writer in the tags. We will be tagging very thoroughly. ENJOY~
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WHAT ARE THE AIMS OF OUR PROJECT? To inform people more about Shakespeare and his work among the plants, to manage a group and how to make it work as a whole, learning how to make a blog and maintain it, to form a better understanding of how projects are done, learning how to schedule our plans and how to keep up with it, combining different skills for the sake of a project, to evolve our creativity/ make us think out of the box, to get better at designing things on a time constraint and to become more confident about expressing opinions.
WHAT HAS BEEN DONE? A group and a conversation were created on Facebook, a schedule for the project was made in Google Docs, a blog was made in Tumblr, meetings between group members were held, many creative posts were written there by the members of the group individually, many additional materials (videos and websites mostly) were found and posted on the blog also and an A to Z of plants used by Shakespeare was created by the group as a whole, with letters divided between members of the group.
WHAT ARE THE OUTCOMES? We formed a better understanding of how projects are done and how to schedule our plans and became more confident about expressing ourselves as a result of writing posts, drawing. In addition we learned how to establish connections between literature and life, culture and nature; and how to work with people from different fields of studies.
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Here is a link to our work of A to Z of Shakespearean Garden. Though there was no plants from the letters J, X and Z.
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A ROMEO AND JULIET GARDEN
There are plenty of plants used in the play „Romeo and Juliet“.
In alphabetichal order Shakespeare mentioned these plants in the play: Bitter-Sweeting (Apple); Dates;Hazelnut; Mandrakes; Medlar; Pear; Pepper(ed); Pink (Carnation); Plantain; Pomegranate; Quince; Rose/s; Rosemary; Rush/es; Sycamore; Thorn; Osier (Willow), Wormwood; Yew
My idea is to make a Shakespearean garden with some of those plants. By clicking on every single one of the plants it will take you to some video found on youtube/ article that will guide you how to grow that plant or how to manage to keep it alive :)
Bitter-Sweeting (Apple)
How to grow from seed - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93V7Lkj2Bq8
How to plant - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSIxzkaDOTA
Dates
How to grow dates from seeds - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_EcKQY6Tkw
"They call for dates and quinces in the pastry."
- Romeo and Juliet, Act IV, Scene 4
Hazelnut
Basically an A to Z of Hazelnut growing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZTS0mdimko
Mandrakes
Since Mandrake is poisonous we are not going to use it in our garden, but I still wanted to point them out in this post. The plants are also used in magic rituals and since the roots look like tiny human figures they are associated with many supersticions. Also, the plants were used in Harry Potter, so here is a fun clip to remember those movies :) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbwWNe_8xjs
Medlar
There is a whole “movie” dedicated to this plant on Youtube and how to grow/take care of them :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrnNHaJ1OMk
Pear
How to grow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqJZIfWDy58
Pink (Carnation)
How to grow from - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQt1aB4_v98
How to take care - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWDqQvdjWHM
“… the fairest flowers o’ the season
Are our Carnations and streak’d Gillyvors”
- The Winter’s Tale, Act IV, Scene 3
MERCUTIO:
"Nay, I am the very pink of courtesy.
ROMEO:
Pink for flower.
MERCUTIO:
Right."
- Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene 4
Pomegranate
How to grow from seed - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggxgV5cj3XQ
"Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate-tree;
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale."
- Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene 5
Rosemary
How to grow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47a2TesaHdg
"Doth not rosemary and Romeo begin both with a letter?”
Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene 4
“Dry up your tears, and stick your rosemary
On this fair corse”
Romeo and Juliet, Act IV, Scene 5
That is my pick for my Romeo and Juliet inspired garden(with some bits from the field). Hope you like it and try out growing some of the plants or making your own Shakespearean garden :)
#shakespeare#shakespeare and nature#green shakespeare#greenspeare#merilin wrote this#pomegrenade#rose#medlar#pear#pink#carnation#nature#date#rosemary#apple#bitter-sweeting#hazelnut#mandrake#romeo and juliet#garden#shakespeare gardens
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Pictures found from this article: https://hyperallergic.com/365003/a-compendium-of-shakespeares-botanicals/
To add a pop of colour into out blog :)
#Botanical Shakespeare: An Illustrated Compendium of All the Flowers, Fruits, Herbs, Trees, Seeds, and Grasses Cited by the World’s Greatest Playwright, by Gerit Quealy with illustrations by Sumié Hasegawa-Collins (courtesy Harper Design)
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Other Green Shakespeare blogs
Since we are doing this thing called ELU project in Tallinn University we have more groups who deal with the same topic. So we are sharing some love and giving them a shout out :)
ELU is in Estonian Erialasid Lõimuv Uuendus(which roughly means that you meet other students from other fields of study and make cool projects with them), it is made obligatory for the students in this uni and with this subject you have to make a project about one topic of your interest. For us - Andreas, Fred, Liisa, Lee, Karlote and Merilin we chose this one - about Shakespeare and nature, called Green Shakespeare.
ELU is also a fun play in words since it means also LIFE in Estonian ;)
THE OTHER BLOGS, so you can check them out and see how they are dealing with this project :)
https://www.instagram.com/aroseofanyothername/
&
http://greenshakespeareg3.blogspot.com.ee/
#green shakespeare#shakespeare#shakespeare and nature#greenspeare#merilin wrote this#blogs#follow#project#instagram#aroseofanyothername#share some love#ELU
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A cool video talking about whether Shakespeare wrote his plays or even existed!
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Some more about the plants in „The Winter’s Tale“
There’s rosemary and rue: these keep
Seeming and savour all winter long
The Winter’s Tale (Act 4, Scene 4)
By seeming, Perdita meant with her words that these herbs keep their foliage all winter and are evergreens. „Savour“ refers to the aromatic oils which make these plants suitable for medical use, and culinary purposes.
As an evergreen rosemary represented both remembrance and constancy and played a part in Elizabethan weddings and funerals. For example, at weddings rosemary was carried by the bridesmaids and sprigs of it were strewn on the ground. There was an old folk belief that if a man could not smell rosemary, then he was incapable of loving a woman. Rosemary wood was also used for making lutes in Shakespeare’s time. Moreover, rosemary has been associated with remembrance since ancient Greece where students would wear garlands of rosemary whilst studying to aid their memories.
In ancient times rue was thought to be an antidote for poison and diseases and it was used in the early Catholic Church to sprinkle holy water and to wash away sins. In Elizabethan England, rue was carried around as a protection against the plague and witchcraft and was used in herbal strewings to repel insects. Due to its bitter taste, the plant symbolizes sorrow, regret and repentance, hence the expression “You’ll rue the day”.
… The fairest flowers of the season are are our carnations…
The Winter’s Tale (Act 4, Scene 3)
Carnations have been a popular English flower for hundreds of years. It is thought that they were introduced into Britain by the Romans who used them to make crowns, wreaths and garlands. There are over three hundred species of carnations with hundreds of hybrids and each in a variety of colors. Generally they express love, fascination and distinction. For example, white carnations suggest pure love and good luck, light red symbolizes admiration, while dark red represents deep love and affection. Purple carnations imply capriciousness and pink carnations carry the greatest significance, beginning with the belief that they first appeared on earth from the Virgin Mary's tears – making them the symbol of a mother's undying love.
Lilies of all kinds,
the flower-de-luce being one! O, these I lack,
to make you garlands of, and my sweet friend,
to strew him o'er and o'er!
The Winter’s Tale (Act 4, Scene 4)
The flower-de-luce is mostly associated with heraldry and purity. It is unclear where the flower originated. One legend identifies it as the lily given at his baptism to Clovis, king of the Franks in the fifth century, by the Virgin Mary. The lily was said to have sprung from the tears shed by Eve as she left Eden.
When daffodils begin to peer,
when heigh! The doxy over the dale,
Why, then comes in the sweet o'the year,
for the red blood reigns in the winter's pale.
The Winter’s Tale (Act 4, Scene 2)
Daffodil’s botanical name comes from the Greek myth of Narcissus who spurned the affections of the wood nymph Echo and fell in love with his own reflection. For this reason it has usually symbolized selfishness and unrequited love.
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I drew the plants around a winged hourglass, because I thought that it would be refreshing to add some other elements to pictures. In The Winter's Tale, a winged figure with an hourglass comes on stage. Time is an allegory with a few meanings in this play. Firstly, time announces that the play has moved on 16 years into the future and the setting has changed from Sicily to Bohemia. Secondly, time also performs the role of a Chorus. Last but not least, the herbs and flowers depicted on the picture have different growing seasons.
The Winter's Tale is a story which entertained our ancestors during the long dark evenings of this season. In Shakespeare's play the young prince Mamillius suggests a melancholy tale as best for winter, and sadness is often present in this much praised work. Sadness may seem an unusual starting point for inspiration, but the pathos, tragedy, comedy and romance found in this particular play reflect not only the humanity of people, but their response on quite a basic level to the colors, scent and textures of the cold winter months. Winter is almost always portrayed as bleak, monochromatic, snowy, white, frosty, bare... However, I regard winter as as being full of sounds, scents, colors and textures as any of the other seasons, only the emphasis is contrasting. As a result I united these two viewpoints through black, white and grey colors and a diverse array of plants.
#liisa wrote this#written by liisa#original post#original art#greenspeare#shakespeare#shakespeare and plants#nature#plants
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A great website found by Liisa.
She said: “I found a fascinating blog about Shakespeare and Elizabethan gardens and tips how to create your own Shakespeare garden. There are also many posts about plants, lore etc “
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“Double, double, toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble!” - “Macbeth” by William Shakespeare
A truly interesting and amazing animated video about Macbeth and why you should also read it!
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A Poem
Here is a poem written with quotations from Shakespeare’s writing. I chose these quotations because they contain plants and are thus related to nature. With every quotation there is a small explanation of its’ meaning.
F or him it was “an almond for a parrot”1,
but “would he know a sheep's head from a Carrot”2?
“Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,”3
“bounded in a nutshell”4, he was cold-hearted.
““How lush and lusty the grass looks! How green!”5
“Let the sky rain potatoes”6 as never before seen!”
he shouted “to hedge me in”7,
but I could not let him win.
““Give not this rotten orange to your friend.”8
I said and saw “it was wise Nature's end”9.
Like “the freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover,”10
I walked away and told him it was over.
1 In Shakespeare’s day “an almond for a parrot” was used to express the greatest temptation that a man could face. Taken from Troilus and Cressida.
http://www.karensgardentips.com/garden-types-styles-and-designs/shakespeares-flowers-and-gardens/shakespeares-plants-almond/
2 “Would he know a sheep’s head from a Carrot” hints that the “he” talked about is not a smart person, because it is not sure whether he can tell the difference between a sheep’s head and a carrot. Taken from A Midsummer Night's Dream. http://www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/trivia3.html
3 “Like to a double cherry, seeming parted” is a comparison between cherries and people. Two people seem as though they are apart, but actually they are joined at the stem like cherries - they are closer than others think. Taken from A Midsummer Night's Dream. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/328644-so-we-grew-together-like-to-a-double-cherry-seeming
4 In original context, Hamlet said "I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space". This meant, that he was an imaginative person, who felt comfortable thinking and living in his head. Directly, the meaning would be something like the following: “I could be enclosed in a small, dark place, but still feel as though I am free”. He would still feel free because of the way his mind worked. So “bounded in a nutshell” on its’ own means enclosed in a small, dark place. Taken from Hamlet.
http://nfs.sparknotes.com/hamlet/page_106.html
5 “How lush and lusty the grass looks! How green!” is just an exclamation, it probably does not have a hidden or added meaning. Taken from The Tempest.
http://nfs.sparknotes.com/tempest/page_64.html
6 In the quotation “let the sky rain potatoes”, the potatoes are supposed to be aphrodisiacs. Falstaff exclaims this phrase to two women. Taken from The Merry Wives of Windsor.
https://www.shmoop.com/merry-wives-of-windsor/act-5-scene-5-translation.html
7 “To hedge somebody in” means to limit, restrict or confine somebody. Taken from Julius Caesar.
http://www.shakespeareswords.com/Plays.aspx?Ac=4&SC=3&IdPlay=19#181660
8 “Give not this rotten orange to your friend” is a quotation that means to not insult a friend. Taken from Much Ado About Nothing. http://nfs.sparknotes.com/muchado/page_152.html
9 “It was wise Nature's end” means that it was nature’s design, it was meant to be like that because of nature. Taken from Cymbeline. http://www.shakespeareswords.com/Plays.aspx?Ac=5&SC=5&IdPlay=7#141235
10 “The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover,” signify plants that used to grow on a meadow, where now only weeds do. Taken from Henry V. http://nfs.sparknotes.com/henryv/page_252.html
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The symbolism and use of nature in William Shakespeare's "King Lear"
William Shakespeare's "King Lear", like many of his other works, entails a number references to sightings and objects in nature. These include various plants, animals, natural phenomena, weather descriptions, even planets. But what do these references mean, how are they used, and how well does Shakespeare's environmental awareness reveal itself, based on "King Lear" alone?
To begin with, the plants mentioned in King Lear are the following: apple, burdock, cork(y), corn, crab(-apple), cuckoo-flowers, darnel, flax, fumiter, furrow-weeds, hemlock, harlocks (burdock), hawthorn, lily (-livered), marjoram, nettles, oak, oats, peascod, rosemary, samphire, vines, wheat (1). While not all of these plants will be discussed in the current essay, we will stop to look at a few of these in their contexts. For example, in act 1, scene 5, when Lear is shunned by his daughter Goneril, he decides to visit his other daughter, Regan, in order to gain shelter, to which Lear's Fool comments:
"Shalt see thy other daughter will use thee
kindly; for, though she's as like this as a crab's like an
apple, yet I can tell what I can tell."
Apple and crab are used to show the difference in the natures of the daughters. In act 2, scene 3, Rosemary is mentioned in the passage where Edgar, Gloucester's son and Edmund's brother, has just escaped out to the countryside, away from his father, after being framed for treason:
"...The country gives me proof and precedent
Of Bedlam beggars who, with roaring voices,
Strike in their numbed and mortified bare arms
Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary;"
Sprigs of rosemary, along with the other items in the list seem to exemplify the futility in the protests of the beggar-class people. The use of marjoram seems interesting because the meaning behind it is less apparent. In act 4, scene 5, when Lear (now insane), walks in on the blinded Gloucester and Edgar and asks for a pass(word), Edgar responds with 'sweet marjoram' and Lear grants the pass. At this point, it is useful to know that marjoram is thought to have medicinal properties that could help cure certain diseases of the brain, which fits well in the given context. In act 4, scene 4, Cordelia, the daughter who was shunned by Lear himself quite early in the play, sends out people to find Lear, in response to the sightings of him:
"Alack, 'tis he! Why, he was met even now
as mad as the vexed sea, singing aloud,
Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds,
With hardocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers,
Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow
In our sustaining corn. A century send forth;
Search every acre in the high-grown field,
and bring him to our eye."
As Cordelia hints, Lear was found in a corn field with a crown of different plants. In his madness, Lear gathered fairly unconventional flowers and weeds, which are either useless or dangerous. Hardocks, hemlocks and nettles are generally stingy to the human skin, with hemlock being poisonous aswell. So, Lear was not just gathering weeds, he was gathering poison. However, cuckooflower is neither poisonous nor a weed, it was used long ago as the Ancient Greeks and Romans lived and as recently as the last century for treating mental diseases (2). This might refer to Lear's subconscious wish to cure his insanity.
In addition to the rich descriptions and symbolism of the plants, "King Lear" also has references to nature on a larger scale in the form of weather, natural phenomena and planets. Due to their size and importance, these examples are not woven into the story the same way as plants are, they are given a bigger stage. In act 1, scene 1, Lear is dividing his kingdom between his daughters and describes the lands he is passing on to Goneril:
"[showing on the map] Of all these bounds, even
form this line to this,
With shadowy forests and with champaigns riched,
With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,
We make thee lady."
In the same scene, after hearing Cordelia's resolve where she professes her love to Lear as his daughter, distances herself from her sisters who are not sincere in their promises and says nothing else in order to gain his favour, Lear says:
"Let it be so; thy truth then be thy dower!
For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,
The mysteries of Hecate and the night,
By all the operation of the orbs
From whom we do exist and cease to be,
Here I disclaim all my paternal care,
Propinquity and property of blood,
And as a stranger to my heart and me
Hold thee from this for ever."
The running themes in "King Lear" to an extent seem to be irony and the act of going against nature, an example of which is shown above, where Lear swears on the sun and orbs (possibly planets), disclaims his role as Cordelia's father and ironically, later in the play, Cordelia is the only person who truly cares about him. In act 1, scene 2, when the Earl of Gloucester hears about his son Edgar's alleged plot against him, he compares the situation to sightings in nature:
"These late eclipses in the sun and moon
portend no good to us. Though the wisdom of nature
can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself
scourged by the sequent effects. Love cools, friendship
falls off, brothers divide. In cities, mutinies; in
countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond
cracked 'twixt son and father."
Gloucester seems to blame the revolt on nature and its cycles. His son Edmund thinks otherwise:
"This is the excellent foppery of the world
that when we are sick in fortune—often the surfeit of
our own behavior—we make guilty of our disasters the
sun, the moon, and the stars, as if we were villains on
necessity, fools by heavenly compulsion, knaves,
thieves, and treachers by spherical predominance,
drunkards, liars, and adulterers by an enforced
obedience of planetary influence, and all that we are
evil in by a divine thrusting-on. An admirable evasion
of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to
the charge of a star! My father compounded with my
mother under the dragon’s tail and my nativity was
under Ursa Major, so that it follows I am rough and
lecherous. Fut, I should have been that I am, had the
maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my
bastardizing."
Edmund puts his trust in Nature, he refuses to accept the exclusion that is imposed on him as the illegitimate younger son. In act 2, scene 2, Kent tries to stop Oswald, who works against Lear, and says:
"No marvel, you have so bestirred your valour.
You cowardly rascal, Nature disclaims in thee; a tailor
made thee."
It seems that betraying Lear and losing honour in that manner goes against nature and such a deed is considered to be man-made. In act 2, scene 4, a storm is heard approaching right after the attitude of Lear's daughters' (Goneril and Regan) is revealed to him, meaning that they refuse to accept him with his men. Aftear hearing this, Lear starts wanting revenge on them, however, it could be said that Lear brought the situation on himself and the upcoming storm symbolises that, it is also a direct punishment on him (Lear has to survive the storm without much shelter) for trying to go against the circumstances that he created. In act 3, scene 2, Lear gives himself to nature's mercy:
"Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain!
Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire are my daughters.
I tax not you, you elements, with unkindess:
I never gave you kingdom, called you children;
You owe me no subscription. Then let fall
Your horrible pleasure. Here I stand your slave,
A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man:
But yet I call you servile ministers,
That will with two pernicious daughters join
Your high-engendered battles 'gainst a head
So old and white as this. O, ho! 'tis foul!"
As he awknowledges his position, Lear also seems to wish for the nature to punish his daughters.
As it turns out, Shakespeare, atleast in the context of "King Lear", was definitely environmentally aware. In addition to using quite a number of plants, some of which have multi-layered meaning in their contexts due to their historical backgrounds, Shakespeare also seemed to compare humanity to natural phenomena and weather, such as storms and the alignment of planets, eclipses, which have influence over people's everyday lives. Most characters accept nature and the power behind it, some of them blame it or try to distance themselves from it, some put their trust in it, but almost everybody acknowledges nature.
Bibliography and sources:
(1) BOTANICAL SHAKESPEARE. Gerit Quealy, Sumie Hasegawa Collins. (2017). Botanical Shakespeare: An Illustrated Compendium of All the Flowers, Fruits, Herbs, Trees, Seeds, and Grasses Cited by the World's Greatest Playwright. Harper design.
(2) William Shakespeare. (2005). The tragedy of King Lear. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press, 214.
THIS GREAT STAGE OF FOOLS. Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds. Source: https://stageoffoolsdotcom.wordpress.com/2013/03/19/crowned-with-rank-fumiter-and-furrow-weeds/
William Shakespeare. (1994). King Lear. Ware, Hertfordshire. Wordsworth Editions Limited.
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Another video about Shakespearean pronounciation, as it is an interesting video and extremely interesting to listen to.
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Plants & their significance in “The Tempest”
Shakespeare has been known to use various plants in his plays, whether for background or to convey significant meaning with the usage of such. The Shakespearean act I have taken under scrutiny today is “The Tempest”, a play believed to have been written in 1610 -’11.
Set on a remote island as it is, the rich use of plants in The Tempest can only come of little surprise, and the plants used by Shakespeare in that play are truly many.
There is common ivy, hedera helix in latin, which is an evergreen climbing plant, but the usage of such could also signify honeysuckle, bindweed and other climbing plants. Sacred to Dionysus, is there any wonder why such plant could have caught Shakespeare’s attention?
Shakespeare notices mushrooms as well – and would mushrooms on their own be interesting, if it were not for the concept of fairy rings made from mushrooms? In the Tempest, Prospero has a few lines of fairies and “midnight mushrooms”, meaning to allude to the superstition that stepping into fairy rings is a thing that one should not do, in a way that even nature should fear it, as “...by moonshine do the green-sour ringlets make, whereof the ewe not bites (...)”
Mallows, malva sylvestris, is found in act 2, alongside nettles, in Antonio, Gonzalo’s and Sebastian’s exchange:
GONZALO
Had I plantation of this isle, my lord,--
ANTONIO
He'ld sow't with nettle-seed.
SEBASTIAN
Or docks, or mallows.
Mallows is known as both a garden flower and an invasive weed, purely depending on where they are grown, nettle being of the same, although also used for medicinal reasons.
There is also mention of a lime or a linden tree, tilia cordata, in act 5, mentioned by Ariel:
“Confined together
In the same fashion as you gave in charge,
Just as you left them; all prisoners, sir,
In the line-grove which weather-fends your cell;
They cannot budge till your release. ...”
Amongst other plants mentioned in “The Tempest”, there are also oats, Pignut (conopodium majus), reeds (phragmites communis), and Vetches (vicia species). Which all proves Shakespeare’s love for nature and his common usage of plants in his works.
Sources: “Shakespeare’s Plants and Gardens: A Dictionary”, Vivian Thomas, Nicki Faircloth
http://wildflowereurope.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Shakespeare-Plants-I-P.pdf
#Lee wrote this#greenspeare#shakespeare#the tempest#shakespeare and plants#plants#written by#original post
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