Saw this on New Years Day. It was good. I enjoyed it. I would have enjoyed it more if the asshole sitting behind me didn't push their feet against my chair, keeping me bolt upright the whole time, but I enjoyed it. So did my friends. I could feel the excitement radiating from one of them. 

My memory of Macbeth is a little sketchy. I've only read it once and that was December 2014. But I'm pretty sure they did a faithful job. I'm pretty sure they left a few scenes out, though that's understandable. The movie is 2 hours, it would have been much longer if everything was in it I'm sure. I liked the way they interpreted the characters' madness. Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard did amazing. I was particularly fond of Fassbender's acting. I thought he did wonderfully. 

It is a dense, intense movie so I recommend mentally bracing yourself before watching it. That said, if you're a fan of the play, I think you'll like this movie a lot. 

Rare treat as Cumberbatch read the "All the world's a stage", the opening line from Shakespeare's As You Like It, in celebration of BBC drama. 

"All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players.
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
Then, the whining school-boy with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then, a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden, and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then, the justice,
In fair round belly, with a good capon lined,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws, and modern instances,
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything." 

I present the first of what I hope to be a long-running series: Book vs. Beer. The premise is simple. We (me and Gordon Highland) find beers that have literary origins. Then we talk about the beer as well as the source material.

For this first episode we discuss Shakespeare Oatmeal Stout (from Rogue Brewery) and Shakespeare, the playwright (from his mother’s womb). Watch to find out why I don’t like Shakespeare.

• Learn more about Gordon Highland here: http://www.gordonhighland.com
• Learn more about Rogue Brewing here: http://www.rogue.com/roguebeers
• Learn more about William Shakespeare here: http://www.william-shakespeare.info

Aaron the Moor is my all time favorite fictional character. He won my heart with his unwavering conviction to be a villain, and to revel in his role. Harry Linnex's performance in the film adaptation of, Titus Andronicus, is absolutely stunning, but in the end it is Shakespeare's words that leave the lasting impression, like a tattoo on your soul. 

Lucius: Art thou not sorry for these heinous deeds?

Aaron: Ay, that I had not done a thousand more. 
Even now I curse the day—and yet, I think, 
Few come within the compass of my curse,— 
Wherein I did not some notorious ill, 
As kill a man, or else devise his death, 
Ravish a maid, or plot the way to do it, 
Accuse some innocent and forswear myself, 
Set deadly enmity between two friends, 
Make poor men's cattle break their necks; 
Set fire on barns and hay-stacks in the night, 
And bid the owners quench them with their tears. 
Oft have I digg'd up dead men from their graves, 
And set them upright at their dear friends' doors, 
Even when their sorrows almost were forgot; 
And on their skins, as on the bark of trees, 
Have with my knife carved in Roman letters, 
'Let not your sorrow die, though I am dead.' 
Tut, I have done a thousand dreadful things 
As willingly as one would kill a fly, 
And nothing grieves me heartily indeed 
But that I cannot do ten thousand more.

University reading list book haul.