Why Memorizing Lines from Shakespeare’s Plays is Thrilling…and Dangerous

“Lord, what fools these mortals be!”

We all have teachers that had a significant impact on our lives, sometimes as early as elementary school but more often in high school. I was fortunate to have two such teachers, one of whom taught physics and chemistry and was a complete wild man. His exploits require more than a short article, but here’s an example: back in the days when we still set off stink bombs in school, he’s the one who gave them to us, enjoying the break as we had to evacuate the building.

The other teacher was wild in a different way: he was wild about William Shakespeare. If you immediately got a mental picture of a skinny, bespectacled scholar, you would be wrong. He was an offensive lineman on the 1965 Odessa Permian High School football team that won the school’s first state championship, 40 years before Friday Night Lights would make Permian famous worldwide. He coached cross-country and soccer. He loved the England National Team and West Ham United (he and Alex Markham would be great friends).

But more than any of that he loved Shakespeare, something he drilled into us relentlessly both junior and senior year. Making a 17-year-old write a character study of Puck from A Midsummer Night’s Dream was torture enough at a time when I was far more concerned with girls, Tom Petty, and girls; making us memorize long passages from the plays was a bridge too far. I just could not do it.

He saw my struggle, and like all great teachers he found a way to make what seemed a useless task relevant to me. I remember what he said like it was yesterday:

“It may seem stupid to you now, but ten years from now you’ll be drunk in a bar somewhere trying desperately to impress a woman and failing miserably. You will then leap onto a table, recite Portia’s speech from The Merchant of Venice by memory, and win both the day and the woman. Trust me.”

When you’re 17, you can be swayed by crazy arguments, especially if they include the words “bar,” “drunk,” and “woman.” So I learned Portia’s speech, graduated, and went on my merry way, confident that the Bard and I would have no further interaction other than the occasional film remake of Romeo and Juliet or The Scottish Play and possibly a performance of Shakespeare in the Park, the only place in Fort Worth where you could legally drink in public.

Fast forward ten years.

I was in my third year in the Army, sitting at a table in the Holiday Inn bar in Savannah, Georgia, well on my way to a serious state of inebriation. There was a young lady at the table who was far more impressed with my buddy’s oak tree-sized biceps than with anything about me. Through the Jack Daniels haze, Mr. Blair’s words came back to me, and I did what anyone would have done in my position: I jumped up on the table and, with as much emotion as I could muster, declared:

The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. ’Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes The thronèd monarch better than his crown. His scepter shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings; But mercy is above this sceptered sway. It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings; It is an attribute to God Himself*

The woman was enthralled, and I was so caught up in the moment that I felt myself rise above the table. Shakespeare’s immortal words literally lifted me; I floated across the bar, through the front door, and crashed to the sidewalk outside. I looked up and saw my buddy standing over me, laughing.

“What happened?” I asked him.

“The bouncers picked you up and threw you out,” he said. “Nice speech though.”

Fast forward twenty more years when I finally reconnected with Mr. Blair on Facebook. I recounted the incident to him, which pleased him greatly. When I asked why he had not warned me about the bouncers, his reply was classic Mr. Blair:

“If I’d told you that, you’d never have done it. It happens to me every time.”

I have recited that speech many times over the years, though I no longer have the dexterity to climb up on tables. I highly recommend it.

*William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act 4, Scene 1

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