Season One, Episode Three
Schwumpf, There It Is

October 21, 2020

What is "Schwumpf?"  Well, it's about making connections.  It's about bringing ideas, feelings, emotions, facts, heresies, and so much more together on a single line of verse.

So sit back, grab some tea, pet a cat, and join us as we learn a bit about the philosophy of what verse drama does really, really well.

glossary

Transcript

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Texts

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Verse: "A Red, Red Rose," Robert Burns

O my Luve is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve is like the melody
That’s sweetly played in tune.

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Verse: Hamlet by William Shakespeare (Act III, Scene 1) 

HAMLET.                   
To be, or not to be, that is the question,
 Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
 Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more…

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Prose: The Tragedy of the Election of the Citrus King by Deb Victoroff

TRUMPIST.           
Stay, sir.  If you brother be, stay your vocal ‘plaint.  You say, “I know,” yet know not, else, why say this result was an error of judgment or bad luck, and not the choice of a free people who spoke and loudly, against oppressions of their own?

Verse: The Tragedy of the Election of the Citrus King by Deb Victoroff

TRUMPIST.           
Stay, sir.  If you brother be,
Stay your vocal ‘plaint. 
You say, “I know,” yet know not,
Else, why say this result was an error
Of judgment or bad luck,
And not the choice of a free people who spoke
And loudly,
Against oppressions of their own?

Homework

1. Spend time with your thoughts: pull them apart to their component stars.  What are some things you’ve schwumpfed together, and do they belong together?
 
2. Look at verse (your own or someone else’s), and look at where the schwumpfs are: what thoughts are schwumpfed together?  Put || between schwumpfs as you see them, such as:

To be || or not to be || that is the question
 
Or:
 
To be or not to be || that is the question

3. Try writing your own verse, and putting line breaks wherever there’s a major change in schwumpf (whatever that means to you)
 
4. If you want to share your findings, either tag us at #hamlettohamilton #h2h or @hamlettohamilton…or join our super-secret Facebook group by joining our Patreon!

Resources

Aristotle

• Aristotle
• Poetics – Book | Gutenberg

 
Samuel Beckett

• Samuel Beckett
• Endgame

 
Ingmar Bergman

• “The Knight Meets Death” from The Seventh Seal by Ingmar Bergman
• “Coffin Scene” from Wild Strawberries by Ingmar Bergman
• “Silent Strawberries” from The Muppets Go to the Movies

 
Bertold Brecht

• Bertold Brecht
• “Alienation Effect”

 
Dr. Jennifer Bugg Wright

• Dr. Jennifer Bugg Wright, Psy.D.

 
Robert Burns

• Robert Burns
• “A Red, Red Rose”

 
Susan Cain

• “The Power of Introverts,” TED 2012 Talk
• Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking

 
G. K. Chesterton

• G. K. Chesterton
• “Heart in the right place” parable in “The Paradoxes of Christianity,” from Orthodoxy (Project Gutenberg)

 
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

• “Sexy French Depression” by Rachel Bloom and Adam Schlesinger

 
 The Complete Rhyming Dictionary

• Book

 
“Dolphin Mind”

• Explaining “Dolphin Mind” Twitter thread from @3TrackMind79

 
The Good Place

• The Good Place
• “How The Good Place taught moral philosophy to its characters – and its creators” by Dylan Matthews, Vox.com
• “Chidi’s Kierkegaard Rap” performed by William Jackson Harper, from The Good Place

 
Lauren Gunderson

• Lauren Gunderson

 
Martin Heidegger

• Martin Heidegger
• Dasein
• “Heiddegger” (Introductory Video) from The School of Life
• “Phenomenology and Dasein,” Heidegger Pt. 1 from Philosophize This!
• “Heidegger’s Being and Time” from Philosophy Overdose

 

• John Mulaney on “New Nazis” from Kid Gorgeous

 
Henri, le Chat Noir

• « Henri 2, Paw de Deux » by Will Braden

 
Edward Hirsch

• A Poet’s Glossary

 
Edmund Husserl

• Edmund Husserl
• Phenomenology
• “Phenomenology” from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• “Mna Mna” song from The Muppets

 
Eddie Izzard

• “Eins, zwei, build an empire,” Dress to Kill

 
Carl Jung

• Carl Jung
• “On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry” by C. G. Jung from StudioCleo.com
• Dramatic Theory and Criticism: Greeks to Growtowski by Bernard F. Dukore

 
Daniel Kahneman

• Daniel Kahneman
• Thinking Fast and Slow
• “Thinking Fast and Slow” Kahneman lecture at Long Now: Seminars About Long-Term Thinking
• “What Happens in a Philosopher’s Brain?” from Philosophy Tube

 
Immanuel Kant

• “Immanuel Kant” (Introductory Video) from The School of Life
• “Beginner’s Guide to Kant’s Moral Philosophy” from Philosophy Tube
• “Is Philosophy Just White Guys J3rk!ngOff?” from Philosophy Tube

 
Soren Kierkegaard

• “Soren Kierkegaard” (Introductory Video) from The School of Life

 
C. S. Lewis

• C. S. Lewis

 
Kristin Linklater

• Kristin Linklater
• Freeing Shakespeare’s Voice  (See “Shakespeare & Co.”)

 
Esther Perel

• Esther Perel
• “Where Should We Begin” couples therapy podcast

 
Philosophy Tube

• Philosophy Tube
• “What Happens in a Philosopher’s Brain?” from Philosophy Tube
• “Beginner’s Guide to Kant’s Moral Philosophy” from Philosophy Tube
• “Is Philosophy Just White Guys J3rk!ngOff?” from Philosophy Tube

 
 Laura Pittenger

• Laura Pittenger
• The HVAC Plays (Or, Adventures in Living Without Basic Necessities, Like Heat and Air Conditioning) by Laura Pittenger

 
Sir Terry Pratchett

• Terry Pratchett
• “Inspiration” quote, from Sourcery
• “First, second and third thoughts” quote from A Hat Full of Sky

 
The Princess Bride

• “Let me ‘splain” scene

 
Monty Python

• The Philosopher’s Drinking Song

 
Sarah Ruhl

• Sarah Ruhl

 
William Shakespeare

• Folger: Shakespeare Texts Online
• MIT: Shakespeare Texts Online

 

• William Shakespeare, Hamlet
  • Kenneth Branaugh “To be or not to be”
  • Richard Burton “To be or not to be”
  • Paapa Essiedu “To be or not to be”
  • Mel Gibson “To be or not to be”
  • Ethan Hawke “To be or not to be”
  • Laurence Olivier “To be or not to be”
  • Andrew Scott “To be or not to be”
  • David Tennant “To be or not to be”

 

• Some silliness with “To be”
  • Shakespeare Live! With a ton of British actors and Prince Charles
  • “A Small Rewrite” with Rowan Atkinson and Hugh Laurie
  • Reduced Shakespeare Company, “To be or not to be”

 

• William Shakespeare, Taming of the Shrew

 
Shakespeare & Company

• Shakespeare and Company
• “Dropping in” (Page 23) from “The Pedagogy of Shakespeare & Company” by Catherine Bryne, Virginia Commonwealth University
• “Dropping In: An Actor’s Truth as Poetry” from IHeartIngrid Blog

 
Emily C. A. Snyder

• “Here,” a Dasein audio poem
• “Still Smarting: Women, Shakespeare, and Processing Emotion” from HowlRound
• “The Modern Melancholy Danes: A Comparison of Kierkegaard and Hamlet” on an absurdly old website from Y2K

 
Konstantin Stanislavski

• Konstantin Stanislavski
• Table Work, Stanislavski System

 
Edith Stein

• Edith Stein
• “Empathy and the Constitution of the Self in the Philosophy of Edith Stein" by Nikolas Prasses from DLC Oxford
  
• “Edith Stein” from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Narcissim and Empathy by Dr. Ramani

 
Deb Victoroff

• Deb Victoroff on New Play Exchange
• Tragedy in monologue form at Dixon Place, NYC
• Tragedy as a drama at the New York Theatre Festival