I have really enjoyed adapting The Two Noble Kinsmen into script. My group has decided to modernize the language of the play, without losing the beauty of Shakespeare’s language. Thus, we tried to keep the text in Shakespeare’s English, while making the language easier to understand for a modern audience. For example, I changed Shakespeare’s text: “A pretty brown wench ‘tis. There was a time/ When young men went a-hunting, and a wood,/ And a broad beech; and thereby hangs a tale- / Hey ho.” (Act three, Scene three, lines 39-42) I modernized this text by saying: “I remember she was a lady, with brown hair. There used to be a time when young men went hunting in the woods and found a lady. That is a tale.” I believe this adaption allows a modern audience to better understand the meaning of the passage. Additionally, I adapted Shakespeare’s text: “There’s all things needful—files and shirts, and/ perfumes;/ I’ll come again some two hours hence, and bring/ That that shall quiet all–.” (Act three, Scene three, lines 46-49) I changed the text to say: “Files, shirts, and perfumes are all things you need. I’ll return in two hours and bring them. That shall make things okay.” These passages still maintain a similar structure to that of Shakespeare’s.

In addition, we have made the play much more concise by including the most important parts of the text. Since we are adapting the play as if there were budget costs, it was imperative to cut most of the characters from the play with the exception of: Arcite, Palamon, Emilia, Theseus, Pirithous, Hippolyta, and the Jailer’s Daugther. The Jailer’s Daugther, however, is going to be a much smaller role. We found her text to be unnecessary, but her presence in the play is important, especially her storyline regarding her love for Palamon, which results in her releasing him from Jail. A fair amount of the work I adapted involved the Jailer’s Daughter. It was an obstacle trying to figure out the best way to preserve her role while eliminating the majority of the characters in the scene. My first encounter with the Jailer’s Daughter was in act three scene four when she goes on a crazy rant. Because our group has decided to decrease her role, I decided it made sense to drastically shorten her monologue to only include her small outburst concerning Palamon. This way, the audience knows about the Jailer’s Daughter’s obsession with Palamon and that there is some hope for the two of them to end up together; thus, the purpose of her role is maintained. In act three scene five, the Jailer’s daughter encounters the schoolmaster and the country people who are about to perform their dance. In this scene, I wanted to mention the daughter’s involvement in the dance while eliminating the rest of the characters. I therefore decided to have the Jailer’s Daughter talk about the dance from her point of view. I also thought it was important to highlight in this scene that the daughter was progressively becoming more crazy. Instead of 3 Countryman and I Countryman discussing the arrival of the mad woman, I had the Jailer’s Daughter mention in her narrative of the dance that the country people had “questioned wherefore a mad woman had come through the wood.” To further emphasize that the Jailer’s Daughter was going crazy I had Theseus say, “Who was screaming over yonder about the stars, omnipresent frogs, a ship, cutting a green coat, shortening her yellow locks, and the purchase of a white cut?” By having Theseus ask about who was screaming, I was able to mention some of the topics the Jailer’s Daughter discusses in her monologue in act three scene four without making the Jailer’s Daughter’s part too long, and I was able to condense some of the play.

I believe our group worked very well together. We all listen to one another and are able to have an engaging discussion about our views. Each decision we made was debated, which has led to everyone participating. Our group is also very organized and communicates well with one another. We have a facebook message and google document where we share our ideas. We debate various ideas in our group facebook message and during class time. The google document is where we post the ideas we want to discuss.  For example, we talked about how we would change the language of the play and in what way we should approach the role of the Jailer’s Daughter. I suggested that we could “make the play more concise by having the same person play both Emilia and the Jailer’s Daugther and see what that means for the play…” Aakash responded to my suggestion with: “I think that it might be interesting to have one person play both characters, but I think It might be too confusing, and may completely change the dramatic impact of the play – Especially if we do it without fully considering the impact of each character (eg. loosing the tension created by the jailors daughter: because she likes palamon, does that mean all girls like palamon more?, because she likes palamon, does it mean that it’s now Arcite’s turn? also, if we make the play concise, we have to be very clear and precise – there is no room for ambiguity, if the play is too short and we try and make one person two characters, the audience will just be too confused.” Our group ultimately decided that Aakash was right. Discussing various ways to adapt the play in this google document really allowed our group to solidify our opinions on what would be the best way to change the play without changing too much. As a group of individuals who are always on top of our work, we have been able to set deadlines throughout the process, which has allowed us to view one another’s work and give feedback. Personally, I found this process very helpful. Reading my peer’s work led me to review mine to make sure our adaption flowed. I also loved being able to ask questions. This resulted in this adaption becoming a learning process.

I learned a lot about myself as a reader of Shakespeare and about myself as a group member. I learned that I have a hard time deciphering Shakespeare’s eloquent language, resulting in my needing to spend a lot of time re-reading lines to understand their meaning. This led to my getting frustrated and finding the process tedious. I never gave up though because I wanted to pull my weight for the project.

Also, I found The Two Noble Kinsmen to be one of my favorite Shakespeare plays. In comparison to the other plays I have read, this one seemed to be much more straightforward. The topic was not only more engaging but also more understandable. I found the relationships between the characters to be somewhat realistic. Palamon and Arcite’s friendship reminded me of a typical friendship between two teenage boys, who let a girl interfere with their friendship.