Ibsen, Shakespeare, and Yeats...Oh my!!!?

Question: Ibsen, Shakespeare, and Yeats!.!.!.Oh my!!!!?

Is drama pretty much non-existent outside of the classroom!? Honestly, how often do you read plays when you're not in school!?

For the older crowd: how many plays have you read since leaving school!?

Your thoughts, opinions, ideas, beliefs, comments, salutations!?

The world is your oyster!.!.!.!.shuck it!!!Www@QuestionHome@Com

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:

No, I don't think drama is nonexistent outside of a classroom!.!.!. Or maybe it is!? Of course it's intended that plays should be watched, so maybe that's why people might not think about them!.!.!. But then people listen to and get plenty of enjoyment out of opera and ballet music outside of the theater, right!?

I love to read plays for pleasure!. They make good use of my overactive imagination! :D I find myself participating more, sort of acting out the characters in my head!.!.!. I think it forces me to become more involved in the scene!.!.!. Reading a play is plenty enjoyable, it's like watching a movie!

In school they only made us read Shakespeare!. Outside of school I discovered Chekhov and went on from there!. :)Www@QuestionHome@Com

I was a drama geek in high school (I played Beatrice once--are you surprised!?) so I read plays fairly regularly outside of the classroom!.

Outside of extracurriculars, though, I don't read them that often--although folks like Ibsen and August Strindberg and Bertoldt Brecht (I love my early moderns) are just as fulfilling read textually as they are performed!. Thanks to the Master's, I've been burnt out on Shakespeare and Marlowe for a while, so I freely admit I stay away from them!.

It's hard to read a play for pleasure--because it's meant to be a blueprint!. It'd be like studying plans of a house with no intention of building it!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

I read most of the plays I've read out of school, actually!. George Bernard Shaw, Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, and Oscar Wilde are personal favorites!. In school I read Shakespeare, but I never bothered with his work again once I got out of college, to be honest!. The Old English bit wasn't to my liking!.Www@QuestionHome@Com