Reading the sanctimonious rant by Amanda MacGregor, feminist and former library assistant, you’d think William Shakespeare was the devil incarnate. This watchdog of woke rights is highly critical of the Bard. She accused him saying, “Shakespeare’s works are full of problematic, outdated ideas, with plenty of misogyny, racism, homophobia, classism, anti-Semitism and misogynoir”—the hatred of black women.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
Shakespeare, born 457 years ago this month, continues to have a monumental impact on students worldwide. But like MacGregor, Dana Dusbiber, a high school educator, believes all that glitters isn’t gold.
Shakespeare may be the gold standard, but hers is a jaded view: “I do not believe that a long-dead, British guy is the only writer who can teach my students about the human condition.” She prefers “literature written by a wide range of ethnically-diverse writers” rather than clinging to “one (white) man’s view of life as he lived it so long ago.”
Granted, Dusbiber and MacGregor are free to castigate Shakespeare. But their fashionable assassination of classic literature exemplifies what C.S. Lewis called “chronological snobbery”—the unfounded logic that art, science and the thinking of a prior age are inherently flawed, worthless and should be discredited.
By contrast, Matthew Truesdale, a high school English teacher, embraces the teaching of Shakespeare and believes banning him is obscene: “To dismiss Shakespeare on the grounds that life 450 years ago has no relation to life today is to dismiss every religious text, every piece of ancient mythology (Greek, African, Native American, etc.), and for that matter, everything that wasn’t written in whatever time defined as “NOW.”
Not surprisingly, the halls of academe are in a pickle: There are those who mimic the efforts to besmirch Shakespeare. During her employment as a high school teacher, Claire Bruncke banished him from her classroom so she could “stray from centering the narrative of white, cisgender, heterosexual men. Eliminating Shakespeare was a step I could easily take to work toward that.”
Put another way, Out, damned spot!
While the cancel culture wants their pound of flesh, Sachel Bise, who teaches special education, is a champion of Shakespeare. She cites an Ohio State University study which found reading Shakespeare arouses and “improves brain function, test scores and social skills.” She says the critics concerns are overblown, adding, “When Shakespeare programs remain in schools, students gain the best advantages.”
Here’s the zany part of the debate.
When pious protesters ban the Bard, they ignore his unquestioned impact upon the English language. Shakespeare invented more than 2,000 useful words and phrases we use everyday—including all of the bold-faced words and phrases in this article.
As good luck would have it, last week my new book Hazel the Outlaw Mummy was able to outsell a Shakespeare play. To be clear, that doesn’t mean Hazel will still be marketable 400 years after its release—as are his works.
Comparatively speaking Hazel is a shooting star while Shakespeare is a moonbeam, shedding unrivaled rays of insight and meaning.
While there are many worthy contemporary authors, none rise to his level of cultural impact. This is why, come what come may from the fiendlike wonk censors, I believe educators should stick with the time-honored place Shakespeare has earned in education. And, by all means, incorporate modern voices to supplement the instruction.
With William Shakespeare, there’s no such thing as too much of a good thing.