Hear a teacher expressing why she loves teaching William Shakespeare's play “Titus Andronicus”
Why Titus Andronicus is this teacher's favourite Shakespeare play to teach.
Courtesy of Folger Shakespeare Library; CC-BY-SA 4.0 (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
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Transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING] GINA VOSKOV: My favorite Shakespeare play is Titus Andronicus. And I know that's kind of crazy. But I love teaching it because it is very, very relevant to today's kind of crazy, violent world. At the high school level, I teach it in full. And in the middle school level, I teach it just little tiny bits and pieces for vocabulary work about ancient Rome.
But I find that it's really wonderful text to teach when you want to talk about revenge, obviously. And so I pair it with some readings from Francis Bacon about revenge. And from the Buddha about revenge, as well, about doing harm to other people.
When I was watching Muammar Gaddafi's tragic end to his life, all I could think about was the joy that the people were taking in taking him down. And that made me think of Titus.
So I came to school the next day and started talking to my students about how the characters in Titus find joy in the revenge and the causing of pain to other people. So that's what I love to teach.
But I find that it's really wonderful text to teach when you want to talk about revenge, obviously. And so I pair it with some readings from Francis Bacon about revenge. And from the Buddha about revenge, as well, about doing harm to other people.
When I was watching Muammar Gaddafi's tragic end to his life, all I could think about was the joy that the people were taking in taking him down. And that made me think of Titus.
So I came to school the next day and started talking to my students about how the characters in Titus find joy in the revenge and the causing of pain to other people. So that's what I love to teach.
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