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SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. The mind loves threes.
Beginning, middle, end.
Birth, life, death.
Knock, knock, knock.

GEORGE:
I knew you’d do that—three examples to explain the “rule of three.”

SHAKESPEARE:
Would you have me offer four? That way lies chaos.

GEORGE:
So why does three work so well? What’s the magic?

SHAKESPEARE:
Because one is a point.
Two is a choice.
Three is a pattern.

GEORGE:
That is… annoyingly perfect.

SHAKESPEARE:
I have practiced.

GEORGE:
Okay—if someone’s never heard the term tricolon, they’ve still heard the sound of it. It shows up in speeches, prayers, comedy, slogans… and in your plays.

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GEORGE:
All right, for the listener who doesn’t want a grammar lecture: antithesis is when you place two opposing ideas side by side—often in a balanced structure—so the contrast hits hard.
Like: light and darkness, love and hate, life and death.
Well let me see let's say give me a famous example one that listeners will recognize
SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. Two wrestlers in one ring. The mind loves a contest.

GEORGE:
Now—here’s my big question. Why does antithesis feel so Shakespearean? It’s everywhere.

SHAKESPEARE:
Because men are everywhere divided.
We want, and we fear.
We swear, and we doubt.
We praise, and we wound.
Antithesis is not merely a device—’tis a mirror.

GEORGE:
So it’s not decoration. It’s psychology.

SHAKESPEARE:
Now you speak sense.

GEORGE:
Okay, give me a famous example—one that listeners will recognize even if they’ve only survived Shakespeare in high school.

SHAKESPEARE:
Then we go to Verona, where passion runs faster than wisdom.

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GEORGE:
Master Shakespeare, are you with us?

SHAKESPEARE (warm, amused):
Indeed, sir. I am ever at your elbow—though I confess, your age is wondrous. In mine own day, men grew old chiefly by avoiding theaters.

GEORGE:
Ha! We’ll take the win where we can.
All right—anaphora. I’m going to pronounce it slowly so I don’t embarrass myself: a-NA-pho-ra.

SHAKESPEARE:
A fair stumbling, sweetly done. And what think you it means?

GEORGE:
Here’s my best “general adult” definition: anaphora is when you repeat the same word or phrase at the beginning of a line or sentence—and that repetition builds rhythm, emphasis, and emotional force.

SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. Like a drumbeat that gathers soldiers—or gathers tears.

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GEORGE (to mic, playful):
All right. Confession
Some people hear the phrase “rhetorical devices” and immediately reach for the nearest exit sign.
But over the years I have learned that rhetorical devices are not decorations. They’re not lace on the edge of language.
They’re engines.
They’re how a speaker makes an audience feel the truth—
even when the truth is… being negotiated.
And Shakespeare? Shakespeare wasn’t born with a quill in his hand.
He was trained.
Today we walk into the rhetoric gym.

GEORGE:
And we’re going to meet the young Shakespeare as he learns the craft of making words do things.

But first

GEORGE:
This is Celebrate Creativity. I’m George Bartley.

This series blends historical research with fiction and imagined conversations. Not a documentary, not advice.

Today: the schooling that made Shakespeare’s language possible—and how those rhetorical “moves” show up in the plays like fingerprints.

Now Picture it: a grammar school. from at least six o'clock in the morning to 6 o'clock at night Monday through Saturday. Repetition that drills itself into the mind.

Latin. Translation. Memorization. Imitation.
Not because the world is kind, but because the world is competitive.
A boy learns to hold language in his mouth like a tool—and to sharpen it.

GEORGE:
Master Shakespeare—be honest. Was Learning about rhetoric miserable?

SHAKESPEARE (pleasant, sardonic):
It was character-building.

GEORGE:
That’s what people say when it was miserable.

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George:
Stratford-upon-Avon is not London. Not even close.
London is noise—argument, urgency, ambition. London is a place where a man can vanish into a crowd and become someone else by lunchtime.
Stratford is… remembered.

Stratford is: “Ah, there he goes—John Shakespeare’s boy.”
Stratford is: “Did you hear what the Ardens are up to?”
Stratford is: “Mind your tongue—your aunt will hear you from three streets away.”

It is a market town, where your reputation is a second coat you can’t remove.

George:
And yet, it is also a place of steady human theatre: bargaining, boasting, flirting, grudges that last twenty years, and kindness that arrives like sunlight without announcement.

Somewhere in that living, breathing scene is a boy—bright-eyed, quick to imitate voices—learning people, not from books, but from… ears.

GEORGE:
So before we talk about plays—before we talk about kings and ghosts and love and murder—let’s talk about the Stratford that made a mind like Shakespeare’s possible.
Don't like that delete thatAnd to help, I’ve invited a special guest.

SFX: A polite knock at an old wooden door.

GEORGE (smiling):
Master Shakespeare?

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Welcome to Celebrate Creativity. I’m George Bartley.

For the next section of this podcast, I’m beginning a new series I’m calling Conversations with Shakespeare. And tonight's episode is called get here anyone who ever try to do the right thing Transition to Shakespeare.

I want to start with something simple—something honest.

I’m doing this now because I’m seventy-five years old, and I have finally stopped worrying about whether I’m doing Shakespeare the “right” way.

When you’re younger, you spend a surprising amount of energy trying to prove you belong in the room. You want to sound smart enough. You imagine that it is important to stay ahead of critics you will never even meet. You worry about being corrected. You worry about being dismissed.

At this age, I’m less interested in proving anything.

I’m more interested in telling the truth—about what Shakespeare has meant in my life, and why I think he can mean something in yours, even if you’ve never read a play, even if high school made you hate the whole idea, even if the word “Shakespeare” makes you feel like someone just assigned you a term paper and forgot to ask if you’re alive.

Because I’m going to argue something gently but firmly in this series:

Shakespeare does not belong only to scholars.
He does not belong only to actors.
He does not belong only to English teachers.

He belongs to anyone who has ever lived long enough to look back on a moment and think, If I could do that again, I might choose differently.

He belongs to anyone who has ever watched a family argument turn into something much bigger than it started as.
Anyone who has ever wanted something so badly they could taste it—only to realize the wanting itself was dangerous.
Anyone who has ever loved someone and thought, How did I get here?
Anyone who has ever tried to do the right thing—and somehow made it worse.

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NARRATOR:
New Year’s Day.
The museum is quiet the way a room gets quiet after somebody says,
“We need to talk.”

Last night the toys lit up the patio with fireworks—
and the Director lit up the Night Watchman with consequences.

And now… here is the night watchmen

NIGHT WATCHMAN (low, to himself):
Okay.
I’m not breaking in.
I’m… returning property.
And maybe… returning hope.

NARRATOR:
He’s been fired.
But he came anyway—because when you care about a place,
you don’t stop caring just because someone took your badge.

SFX: the door to the office of the director of the museum opens. A chair scoots. Papers shuffle.

DIRECTOR (off, mild but firm):
Mr. night watchman, I wondered if you’d show up to see me.

NIGHT WATCHMAN (startled):
Sir—! I— I can explain—

DIRECTOR:
Good.
Because I have a clipboard, three forms, and a pen that has already forgiven me for what I’m about to do.

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NARRATOR:
The Night Watchman rises from his desk and follows the sound—past the exhibits, past the quiet corridors, toward the patio doors.

Outside, the winter air holds that New Year’s feeling: cold, sharp, expectant.

And inside the museum… something is celebrating like it has a permit.

SFX: Door latch. Soft squeak. Patio door opens.

SCENE 1 — THE PATIO REVEAL
SFX: Outdoor patio ambience: faint wind; distant city fireworks; then—very close—party pops, tiny whistles, and toy-sized cheering.

NIGHT WATCHMAN (stunned):
Oh.

Oh, no.

NARRATOR:
The Watchman steps onto the patio and sees it: toys everywhere, arranged like a gala. A “stage” made from stacked display risers. A “VIP area” behind a velvet rope they have somehow… acquired.
And at the center: a very earnest planning committee.

BARBIE (bright, authoritative):
Okay! Everyone! Remember: we are doing this with taste.

KEN (trying to sound official):
Taste. With… also excitement. Tasteful excitement.

SLINKY (bouncy, nervous):
Taste is good! Taste is safe! Taste does not summon the fire department!

ETCH A SKETCH (grand, French-leaning, dramatic):
Non, non, non—taste is not enough! We require… symmetry. We require… balance. We require… a finale that is like… how you say… a ballet of the stars.

RUBIK’S CUBE (dry):
A ballet of the stars. On a patio. In December.

FURBY (1998-ish, with a little furbish sparkle):
Doo-ay! Tee-kah! PARTY-PAHTY!

NIGHT WATCHMAN (calling out):
Okay—okay—everybody freeze.

SFX: A chorus of little “Eep!” “Oh!” “Gasp!” A springy boing.

NIGHT WATCHMAN (trying to sound calm):
What… is going on out here?

BARBIE (as if this is obvious):
It’s New Year’s Eve.

NIGHT WATCHMAN:
Yes. I’m aware. I have a calendar. A very judgmental calendar.

KEN:
We’re doing a midnight celebration.

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