shakespeare is a filthy, dirty, disgusting pervert freak...

so say the ninth graders. and i know what you're thinking but this is not entirely my fault. when i was in high school my class read canterbury tales. our teacher, mrs. walther, anticipated the whining we might do over a book we knew nothing about and she was ready for us. "this book is so dirty," she said, peering over her glasses with a wicked smile, "i can only give you a few of the tales to read." i have never needed to read anything more than i needed to read canterbury tales right that minute. we looked for seedy, lascivious, lewd lines everywhere. "he walked down the road," would elicit knowing smiles all around the room when read aloud. "you know what that means," someone would whisper and we'd all nod knowingly, wishing we did know. it just meant he walked down the road. still, we read. we'd read any tales she'd give us. pardoner. summoner. wife of bath. that wife of bath was something else indeed.

so as we got ourselves ready for shakespeare, for romeo and juliet, i thought about mrs. walther and her glasses and her smile. and when i said shakespeare out loud and then romeo and juliet right after they groaned. they whined. they feigned sickness and death. they splayed themselves lifeless across desks. and i smiled, hoping my own glasses would slide down dramatically at the right moment like mrs. walther's had. i looked out at the kids, glasses slipping down so my eyes peered out over the tops. i conjured up my most cruel smile and i smiled it slowly. "you know nothing!" i spat at them. "if you knew anything at all about shakespeare you'd be begging me for sonnets and plays. begging. you have no idea. you think he's all stuffy and boring but that's just because you've never read the stuff. you probably just don't get the dirty parts anyway." i smiled again, hoping i was doing it right. they perked right up. dirty?

suddenly there were questions. would we be reading the original text or the stupid version? these are actual student words. i assured them the original (as original as anything that old can be) text would be theirs, along with an updated version for those who would like both. why do we have to read the sonnets first? to help ease folks into the way this guy writes and, more importantly, the way he thinks. and of course the most asked question. how dirty? bodies shifted in seats. throats cleared. i explained that the sonnets were written mostly to a dreamy young man and a mysterious dark lady, neither of which were shakespeare's wife. both of which inflamed the guy's passion. wow, they said. dirty.

now, it should be noted here that dirty to ninth graders really just means anything beyond the current reach of the ninth grader. if the ninth grader has never kissed someone, kissing is dirty. gigglably dirty. i gave them sonnet 18, written for this glorious young man. i'd seen this done in other classes, seen this lesson plan- students get a sonnet and translate it into their own teen culture language. so we start.

shall i compare thee to a summer's day? is the first line and i suggested yo, baby. you hot as summer. this goes over well. they figure out the major secrets of the sonnet, seeing it as a song of praise, more or less, promising this young man immortality in the words of the poem. this is pretty common, i tell them. lots of poets try to score by telling the objects of their desire that they can make them live forever on the written page. they grapple with the fact that the object is a young man, trying to figure out how to read it. they settle on the fact that the poet admires the qualities of the young man. they are delicate about it. they want to understand this sort of relationship.

but then i turn them loose. they assemble into groups of four and each group gets one of two sonnets- 128 or 130, both about the mysterious dark lady. one lascivious and the other just mean, it seems. they put themselves together in single gender groups for the most part. they know there will be something dirty to discuss and they want to be comfortable to really say what they think. they are going to rewrite. i am surprised they struggle more with sonnet 130. they get that he's saying all these awful things about this woman, his woman, and they're shocked by the specific cruelties. "wait, he's saying she has ugly breasts? what is wrong with this guy?" these area children who have very little experience with breasts and they're at that gift horse place. if the woman lets you look at them, you're getting a good deal. shut up and be grateful. "he says her breath stinks!" is followed by shaking of heads in the group reading this line. this is not the way to get a woman to kiss you. and then they say the thing that's not what i expect. i expect them to say why is he with her if he thinks she's ugly, but here's what they say- "why the hell is she still with him?" they assume he's telling her all this stuff and they think she should dump him because he's a jerk. i tell them to keep going. they have not yet reached the final couplet.

other groups work with 128, where the speaker watches his beloved play the concertina and wishes pretty much he could be the keys under her hands. this, to a ninth grader, written on the page, is totally dirty. i have heard them say things out loud in my classroom that have melted the skin of my ears but this language in shakespeare- shakespeare- is way dirtier to them. because he is not a teenager. because he is completely famous and totally dead and grown ups respect him. "miss, do you know what he wants to do?" one group of girls screams. "miss, i can't read this!" there are giggles as they turn themselves right back to the offending words. suddenly, shakespeare is delicious.

they work right up to the bell, loud conversations, fits of giggles and whispers. nobody gets up. nobody walks around. nobody talks to anyone outside their group. they are riveted. they will not finish by the end of class so we gather things up and plan to resume monday. the bell rings and kids slowly file out. a group of girls stays behind. they are wide eyed and animated. they want to keep talking about what they just read. "it's the couplet, miss!" says one of them breathlessly. "something happens to switch everything around." she has been reading about the concertina playing. i tell her about sonnet 130, about how he says all these awful things but in the end says he loves the woman more than any other. jaws drop. amazing. "that's so cool!" yells a ninth grade girl. you heard right. shakespeare and his awful sonnets are cool. and i nod and smile, not the smile mrs. walther had when she told us about canterbury tales, but a whole, unrestrained smile, just like what i'd see all over her when she'd talk to us about whatever wonderful piece of literature she'd drag in to share with us.

Sonnet 128

How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st,
With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap,
At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!
My lips lack the nerve to kiss your hands
To be so tickled, they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips,
O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,
Making dead wood more blest than living lips.
Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.

Sonnet 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun,
Coral is far more red, than her lips red,
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun:
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head:
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks,
And in some perfumes is there more delight,
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know,
That music hath a far more pleasing sound:
I grant I never saw a goddess go,
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet by heaven I think my love as rare,
As any she belied with false compare.