Shakespeare asks the question that never gets old

Attempting to read all the plays in 2025

Jan 25, 2025

Saturday Morning Serial is the weekend section of Library Binding. It’s a personal corner where I publish short stories, book reviews, and literary musings. I’m Michelle Watson, and I’m so glad you stopped by.

A photo from my visit to the Globe back in 2010

Earlier this month, I talked about my love-hate relationship with reading goals.

One of my 2025 goals is to read all of Shakespeare’s plays.

I’m doing this alongside Elsie at Tea & Ink Society. She strategically filled a calendar with 38 dramatic works that, by this time next year, will be sitting snugly (hopefully not smugly) under my belt.

I’ve read four plays so far.

Twelfth Night, which is usually the best place to start, right?
King John, which I’d never heard of in my life
A Comedy of Errors, which everyone has heard of but few have read
Richard II, which had me swapping my sympathies left and right

I’ve read more Shakespeare than the average person on the street (probably), but prior to starting this challenge, I’d read (or seen performed) a mere 11 of the 38 plays on the list.

I’m excited to finally take them all in.

If this sounds like your idea of fun, then you can join Elsie’s free Shakespeare challenge right here.

This isn’t the original Globe, which burned to the ground in 1613. A second Globe was rebuilt on the same spot a year later. It closed in 1642 and was demolished within two years. This is a 1997 reconstruction on (almost) the same site.

The big question

I’m not a Shakespeare scholar. Just a groundling.

But you don’t need to be a scholar to notice that certain questions reoccur in many of Shakespeare’s plays.

One of those questions is Who Am I?

I’m Michelle Watson. It’s nice to meet you.

Shakespeare politely asks my name. He gathers my physical description, gender, marital status, and family lineage. But he doesn’t stop there.

He takes into consideration where I live, what I do for work, who I voted for, and how I spend my free time.

But he wants more.

He wants to know who I am when I’m stripped of all of the above. What’s underneath those outer layers?

What happens when I’m thrown into the pressure cooker? Who am I in the face of temptation, manipulation, and grief?

When I’m squeezed, what comes oozing out? That’s probably who I am.

Shakespeare isn’t afraid to torture and kill his characters to get this information from them. He keeps pushing and twisting and stripping away layer after layer until all that remains are the character’s true colors.

A much younger me sitting in “the queen’s seat” in the Globe

Everyone thinks they know you (and sometimes they do)

In A Comedy of Errors, Antipholus of Syracuse stumbles into a town where his twin brother (also named Antipholus) has been living for years. The newcomer is baffled by the fact that people in the street greet him as a friend. Some hand him money they owe him. Others invite him places. Others thank him for kindnesses, while many offer him goods to buy.

I don’t know them, but they know me, Antipholus muses.

This reminds me of the internet. The computers know where you shop, who your friends are, what you’re curious about, and how you spend your spare time. They know you so well that they can predict what kind of groceries, beauty products, medicines, and TV shows you want, nay, need in your life. You don’t know the bots, but they seem to know you.

Also, these days, we are quick to extrapolate a stranger’s identity based on a few hot takes and treat them accordingly. “You support that? Okay, I know exactly who you are then.”

If I don’t know who I am, then I very well might, like Antipholus, say, “Until I know this sure uncertainty, I'll entertain the offered fallacy.” Translation: Since I have no idea what’s going on, I’ll just pretend to be who other people assume that I am.

Why do we let strangers tell us who we are? We shouldn’t.

But…if it were that simple, Shakespeare wouldn’t be interested. Sometimes other people can see through us, and their keen observations hit the bullseye.

I’m thinking of Feste in Twelfth Night. He’s Lady Olivia’s fool. She keeps him around for songs and laughs. When he first appears onstage, he calls Olivia out. She’s mourning the deaths of her father and brother, but she has allowed her grief to overflow its banks into unhealthy excess. Everyone in Olivia’s household can see this plain as day—except her—but nobody has the guts to say it except Feste because he’s just joshing after all.

Sometimes, other people are right about us. Ouch.

Doubt and false appearances make us question who we are

In Twelfth Night, Viola decides to pose as someone else. She assumes a false identity. Oh, sheesh. Nobody does that these days. Who goes around pretending they’re someone they’re not?

Sounds a lot like social media to me. A little face-tune here…a little strategic cropping there… Show only the best, and hide the rest.

Who hasn’t experienced, on some level, a disconnect between their public persona and their true self? We all have.

Sometimes that persona takes on a life of its own, one that we don’t fully control, and we begin to lose touch with who we truly are. We feel like we must act a certain way at work, for example, or people won’t take us seriously. Or, we want to keep a relationship, so we decide to be who our partner wants us to be. Time passes, and we wonder, Is this who I am now?

Shakespeare’s characters either figure it out, or they go mad. Or die.

Who wants to know?

Shakespeare’s drive to know his characters—it’s impressive and compelling.

Why?

Because there is a Creator who knows his children. And we, the creation, desire to know our Father.

“But you, O Lord, know me; you see me, and test my heart toward you.” –Jeremiah 12:3

This mutual knowing is soul-precious.

Everyone yearns to be known. Even if we initially resist, most of us value a conversation that goes beyond pleasantries and gets personal. We want loyal friends who ask questions and then challenge our answers and demand we tell them everything because they care. At times, these people may grate like iron on iron, but we love the resulting sharpness—and closeness.

In life, there’s only so much that we can know—through a glass darkly and all—but the pursuit of communion, companionship, fellow feeling, and insight is a worthy one.

In the pursuit, we reach toward our Maker and all things made.