i have a theory.
our generation does not hate shakespeare because his writing is too old or because we do not understand it. we hate shakespeare because we find him embarassing, not embarrassing in himself but embarrassing in the way a mirror is embarrassing. he forces us to look at the one thing we spend our lives trying to avoid: feelings. he is too much, too dramatic, too raw, too painfully human. we call him cringe because he was deep in his emotions, but what we really mean is that it feels too close to the truth. somewhere along the way we decided that depth is embarrassing, vulnerability is weak, sincerity is corny, romance is delusional, and expressing pain is doing too much. we laugh at romeo and juliet’s tragedy, yet every one of us knows their story, and even when we pretend to be detached from tragedy and longing, we can never run away from them.
we are a generation addicted to performance, and social media has turned that addiction into a lifestyle. i don’t hate social media. in fact, i enjoy it. i find it entertaining and inspiring, but it has also created a strange emotional illiteracy. we see people in two dimensions, a photo, a clip, a reel, a curated moment and we’ve come to accept that as the new normal. we want snippets of curation to validate the depressing void we feel in our lives. we do not see what happened after the photo, we do not see the arguments, the anxiety before posting, the deleted drafts, or the hours spent editing a face into someone more valuable, more desirable to strangers. we do not see the fear of being disliked or the loneliness behind perfection, and the sad truth is, we don’t really want to. we want to be curated rather than real, not only online but in everyday life. we say there is a problem with the system yet choose friends who look impressive, friends who make our lives appear valuable, and then we wonder why everyone feels lonely.
it’s because we’ve turned life into a portfolio.
we do not want truth, we want image. we do not want sincerity, we want aesthetic. we do not want depth; we want what is easy to consume. shakespeare is the opposite of easy consumption. he is emotional and uncomfortable, and he drags human tragedy into the light and asks us to look. And looking requires honesty about our selves, and honesty requires self-awareness, which is what we avoid. so, we call it cringe because it is easier than admitting we are afraid of vulnerability and afraid of looking foolish.
but, being human is cringe. falling in love is cringe, missing someone is cringe, crying is cringe, writing poetry is cringe, saying what you really mean is cringe. the real tragedy is not romeo and juliet or hamlet or othello. the tragedy is living in a world where feeling is embarrassing, and numbness is considered ‘cool’.
well, i’m currently in my sensibility era. but do i like shakespeare’s work? not yet. do i understand it? most definitely. i find it commendable how he managed to turn human tragedy into devastatingly sorrowful art. i understand why people loved shakespeare. he was honest, and raw, and tragic. and maybe being vulnerable is the bravest thing a person can be.