So it’s Willy’s 450th birthday today: To care or not to care?

He’s the man with the right quote for any situation. Without him, we wouldn’t have “swagger” and “gossip”. He even invented the word “eyeball” along with 1700 other commonly used words.

But it’s been almost half a century since his birth – and we’re still banging on about him?

Romeo and Juliet, King Lear or Othello, we all had at least one Shakespeare play rammed down our throats through secondary school. The man has an entire English GCSE exam dedicated to him for god’s sake.

You’ve got to hand it to the guy though, whether we like him or not, he is a pretty massive deal, despite some of us calling him, in his own words, a “lump of foul deformity”.

Modern day Willzy

April 23^rd marks 450 years since the birth of our beloved William Shakespeare. He’s got 40 plays and about 154 sonnets under his belt and to our ‘amazement’ (yes, he made that up) it’s believed that one is performed around the world every minute of every day.

But are we bothered and should he still be considered relevant today?

English Literature student Molly Murray from Sheffield University says: “Yes. He was a revolutionary man. He is vital to the understanding of any literature that came after his time”.

Chloe Platt, studying English Literature and Hispanic Studies at Kings College London agrees saying: “To put it simply, a lot of the themes of the works are timeless even if the language can be a barrier to modern audiences”

Shakey also has Alevel exam questions entirely dedicated to him…

Clearly, some believe Shakespeare is a national ‘champion’ (you guessed it, he made that up too!) in the history of English literature. Despite the language being 450 years old and torturous to digest, some say he deserves all the credit he still receives.

Undoubtedly though, many of us can’t stand his farfetched tendencies and therefore disagree with his everlasting legacy:

L.P, a Geography student from Durham University argues, “How many times do we hear or have we been asked in exams about Shakespeare’s portrayal of strong women? Where were all these strong women in Shakespearian times? Even the female characters were male actors! [They are] Fictional characters with no reflection whatsoever of reality!”

Some imaginative insults from the man himself…

Personally, I understand why Shakespeare’s work is still so alive today and, to an extent, agree that his work is still very much relevant. Perhaps if an obligatory interest and passion for Shakespeare wasn’t made compulsory from such a young age, more young people would enjoy his works.

This hasn’t been recognised by Westminster as new reforms revealed by Education Secretary, Michael Gove, will see Shakespeare’s plays given a more central role to the national curriculum. As from September it will be compulsory for all 11-14 years old to study two complete plays at a minimum.

So should Shakespeare, the most influential writer in the world, be given such a central focus in the national curriculum when topics such as sex education and other important areas are hugely lacking?

What do you lot think?