Really? The royal we? The royal our here? To his wife? Do not fear our person is very formal language. Very formal. And it’s usually explained as an explanation for why Gertrude should let Laertes go – as she should not fear “our person.” But I wonder if it might be to Laertes, given the formality of the language.
Or rather – it may be said TO Gertrude but it is for the benefit of Laertes…a way to tell him without telling him that he, Claudius, was not afraid.
Or maybe even better – to formally declare he is not afraid of death – that he is protected by some divine bubble. It’s like, a sideways way to say he’s leading a charmed life. He might as well be declaring he can’t be killed except by someone not born of woman. But he would never say it directly…so, sure, he can tell Gertrude not to be afraid for him but it is really a way to shift the fear onto Laertes. To make him hesitate to run a sword through him.

As I write this, it is the day after the presidential election of 2016. It’s a dark dark day from my perspective. And I am horrified and flabbergasted to learn that over 50% of white women voted for Trump. I’m just…stunned. I’m a white woman myself and you could not have paid me enough money to vote for that horrifying racist misogynist sexist dumpster fire. And I’m trying to understand what was going on in those other white women’s minds.
I wonder if it isn’t some thing like this line. Here’s a dark, criminal of a king being righteously confronted by someone who has been justifiably wronged – and Gertrude leaps in to defend Claudius. Not just with words but with her whole body. Has she given over her sense of self to her husband somehow? Does she feel some protective instinct over the darkest king? Does she choose the most powerful man to back and defend? I don’t know. It baffles me. So so much.
What were you thinking my fellow white women?
Are you more afraid of people of color than the most terrifying tyrant we’ve ever seen in this country? I guess so.

And now, as I prepare to upload this to the site, it is almost two years later. And the women clinging to Brett Kavanagh during this hearing are demonstrating a similar impulse to lean into the horrors. I do not understand. At all.

Giant-like? Huh? What a funny choice of words!
It’s like – the rebellion is big…but not…it’s LIKE a giant – but not gigantic. Is that what Claudius is attempting to express? That the rebellion isn’t as big as it might seem? Is it a way to manipulate Laertes right from the outset? I wouldn’t put it past him.

The play I’m working on now features a character who is afraid of doors. This is a late breaking development in the character, in the play and solved many dramaturgical problems when it made its way into the piece. It was as if the answer was always there, waiting underneath the ground, waiting to be dug up. It was the final puzzle piece that led to a satisfying ending. It showed up when one of our actors asked “Is she afraid of doors?” And the lights went on. Yes. Yes she is. That’s it. I didn’t think this had anything to do with me. It just seemed like a neat literary solution.

Then I had a session with my Rubenfeld Synergist and it came out that I felt I had two very heavy oak doors protecting a group of delicate dancers – Isadora Duncan style dancers. And I realized that I’d put Duncan herself, as well as a group of delicate dancers/priestesses into a play – probably a year before. I would have sworn up and down that Duncan had nothing to do with me – that that play wasn’t personal. Except of course it was.

And the doors…the doors. The doors in the Duncan play connected to the doors that Zerlina was afraid of in The Door Was Open.

Strange artistic overlap? Motifs? Was I subconsciously working on a theme? Then last night, I was typing up some writing I did about 6 months ago on a novel – a completely separate project in a completely different medium and I noticed myself typing, “She reacted to the door as if it were a demon.”

And damn, if I hadn’t written entirely different character who was afraid of doors. For entirely different reasons of course, in vastly different circumstances – but…if you’d asked me before all of this “Is a fear of doors a thing?”

I’d have said No. No one is afraid of doors. That’s silly. People are afraid of snakes, rats, elevators, planes, etc. But doors? Not a thing. And I certainly am not afraid of doors so these plays are not about me.

Unless we look at them metaphorically and then it might be possible that yes, indeed, some part of me MUST be afraid of doors.

This coffeeshop has a series of bookshelves and on it are books. But almost none of them are books I’d want to read. I’m a fairly omnivorous reader but these books are very particular brands of self help – like: Babies with Down Syndrome: A new Parent’s Guide and Gold Rush: How to collect, invest and profit with Gold coins. It also features lots of dreamy pastel covers for what I assume is something called Angel Fiction (one is called The Eternal Rose) contrast those with the books with a dark bold font that screams macho pulp fiction. Probably several people will be shot and at least one of the main character men will have a torrid affair with a prostitute. There is also a copy Dictionary of Aquarium Terms and The Poet’s Market from 4 years ago. It feels like this is where books go to die – or just become decoration. I guess it’s good that they have somewhere to go! All this matter will not have mattered in vain.

I would like to have a pair of Switzers outside the door of my personal space. I’d like to call them into action when things get tricky, when I need some stern faces to protect me from the outside world. I wouldn’t overwork them, I hope – but on occasion, I’d like to keep them on retainer.

It’s funny to think of Swiss fellas as being the go to guard – the mercenaries of their age (and still are for the Pope.) The Switzerland I think of is famous for neutrality – but the relationship between those things is interesting. You CAN be hired muscle if you famously don’t pick sides. Maybe the neutrality we think of now originated in that mercenary impulse. You could hire them because they were hire-able – and then that quality made them good candidates for neutrality.

Extra death, excessive death, too much death, which, of course, there absolutely can be. The TV show I was watching last night had superfluous death. But any death that happens to YOU is too much. You don’t need extra death to have too much death as an individual. Death on top of death isn’t really possible. You really only need one to have too much of it.
But I suppose Claudius feels as though he’s being killed in multiple places. He’s getting the scattershot of the cannon, feeling lots of hits. But he is actually fine. That he can stand there to say this would suggest he’s doing okay.

O will people put some poison in one another’s ears? Is that a thing you’re worried people might do? Even if it’s metaphorical poison?

This is such a curious turn of phrase, though. It’s like, built to be unclear. It’s a very convoluted idea after a series of fairly concrete images. It’s abstract.

Necessity personified and going around trying people in other people’s ears due to lack of information? It’s a hard right turn in this speech. Very very interesting.

Feeding on wonder and keeping one’s self in clouds doesn’t necessarily sound bad. It sounds rather dreamy certainly. It makes me think of Elfine in Cold Comfort Farm who periodically drifts through the woods spouting poetry. I have some sympathy for this romantic impulse for the desire to eat awe, to float, to never touch the ground.
But of course in this case, the wonder is not at the beauties and majesties of nature and the clouds are not likely the white puffy kind that angels like to play on. But it’s interesting that Claudius has chosen these words with their usually positive connotations to describe something that he definitely does not think is good. The sentence has a rather beautiful quality of starting in this light, airy place and slowly descending through buzzers to infect to pestilent and ending on death.