Shakespeare performed and cooked potatoes

Shakespeare was a playwright and a poet. Shakespeare was a not novelist, he was not an english high school curriculum developer, nor a language professor. His works could perhaps be useful in all these regards, but this does not change what his works are. They are plays, pièce de théâtre, to be performed and beheld in all extravagance.

I have noticed that it is generally assumed that one should read a Shakespeare play as a novel in order to understand and appreciate his work. And yet the bare nature of Shakespeare's works, the mere fact that they are plays, dictates indisputably that they are to be performed, and not to be read through. Of course there is much benefit and joy in doing this if we have inclination, but we are not to suppose that in doing so we are appreciating them for what they are.

How can I have the insolence to dictate how one should enjoy Shakespeare? I answer that I do not presume to impose upon a person anything more that what Shakespeare himself imposes upon any who would but hear him.

It strikes me as odd that many appear study a Shakespeare play as they would study, say, Milton's ‘paradise lost’. As if the two were in the same category.

But what is the difference? perhaps you shall say; ‘they are both a very beautiful accumulation of words by the hand of a poet.’ It is true that both are beautiful and well written. Both of them ingenious and moving. But in purpose they are completely different. One is written to be read, the other to be performed. In their very essence they are incomparable.

Why is it that with Shakespeare we suddenly forget that the beginning of understanding anything written, is understanding its purpose and type. We generally understand this concept without ever considering it; think how strange it would be for someone to read David Copperfield in an attempt to learn how to sail the English coast. We do not read a sonnet as we would read a scientific article. We do not read a lawsuit as though it is a romantic fairy tale, we do not read the lyrics of a song as if they were a systematic theology , why then do we read a play and forget what a play is? Why do we read a play at all?

One argument that is perhaps unspoken yet seems fixated in the minds of many, is that Shakespeare is more pure when unsullied by the interpretations of any actor. That to ‘understand’ or ‘appreciate’ Shakespeare's writing truly, we should read it exactly as it is written with no other influence. This argument would indeed be valid if Shakespeare wrote a novel or news article or commentary, but the fact is that Shakespeare wrote with the express purpose of being interpreted by an actor. His work is given its intended life when acted and interpreted, and is rather sullied when this is left undone.

I do not attempt to devalue the virtue of the study of Shakespeare, nor the utilization of Shakespeare's works for any useful purpose one can conceive, and yet this should never cause us to forget what Shakespeare works are.

To suppose one's own utilization of Shakespeare's writing purer when unsullied by his own purpose, is as absurd as to suppose that a recipe is purer and more appreciated when unsullied by baking. As potatoes should be cooked, as movies should be watched, as fresh bread should be eaten, so Shakespeare's plays should be performed.

One wonders why the average man does not enjoy reading Shakespeare, one forgets that the average man does not enjoy eating raw potatoes.