ENJOY
SHAKESPEARE IN A SIMPLIFIED VERSION!
TEN COMPLETE SCRIPTS ARE AVAILABLE HERE!
| The following ten plays have two purposes.
Firstly, they give you the chance to practice everyday conversation in
English. Secondly, they give a suggestion of the most important writer
of English, Shakespeare. These plays were not written by Shakespeare, but
the chief characters and the theme are his. If you like these plays, then
later you may wish to read Shakespeare's own words. He lived from 1564
to 1616, so his grammar and words are difficult today. Japanese think them
difficult. Englishmen think them difficult. So today the problem is the
same for everybody. Many people have written explanations of Shakespeare.
Do not waste time reading these. Many of them are nonsense. It's better
to read even one line of Shakespeare, and then think about it for a long
time. Here is an example: Julius Caesar, line 844. As so often,
Shakespeare uses a very few words to express a very important idea. "....when I tell him he hates flatterers, He says he does, being then most flattered." Who could improve that?
Cinna
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To open each file above might take around two minutes; be patient, please!
INTRODUCING CINNA
Cinna is a pseudonym. His real name is Michael John Simon Flinn(1932〜1994).
He was born in |
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Dar-es-Salaam,Tanzania as a British national. He majored in philosophy
in Oxford. Upon graduatiion, he went to the United States, and started
teaching English in New York public schools while studying performing art
in several theatrical groups. Then he moved to Canada and lived with Eskimos
as an English teacher for some years. Around 1966, he came to Tokyo and
started again to teach English in some high schools and colleges, including
prestigious Kaisei High School, and Keio University. At the same time he
wrote this simplified series of Shakespeare for Japanese students and organized
a students' Shakespeare festival called OASIS(Open Air Shakespeare
In Summer) in Seibu-en ourdoor theater in Tokyo suburb. Cinna enjoyed serenity,
moonlight and candlelight most of all, and in a sense he seems to have
lived a life of Shakespeare in the 20th century.