Drabble Set - The King's Players.
24 Sep 2011 10:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
curiouswombatThis is a set of drabbles written for the 'Shakespeare' challenge at Tolkien Weekly.
I'm not sure if they are the first ever drabble set to cross Shakespeare with Middle Earth, but in them I imagine a copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare somehow having slipped between dimensions so that it now forms the repertoire of a troupe of travelling players in Middle Earth...
If you can't work out which play is which I will put a list at the end!
Rating G
Characters, apart from 'The Players'; Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Faramir, Elladan & Elrohir.
The Plot's The Thing
“There will be players,” Aragorn had said, and both his friends seemed pleased at the thought. But now they seemed uncomfortable, with odd glances back and forth between them, as on the stage the tale unfolded.
Obviously carefully chosen the play contained a royal wedding and, to honour the Queen, there were even ‘elves’.
These ‘elves’ were celebrating in a forest glade when, in their midst, appeared ‘non-elves’ who stumbled about, blindly, destroying the feast with their clumsiness.
Aragorn wished he knew why Legolas murmured, “They should be dwarves…” and Gimli harrumphed – but seemed to blush up to his ears.
Players Tell the Strangest Tales
“Let me get this straight…” Elladan began, “the players are telling a tale of identical twins who become separated by a shipwreck. Oh, and they both have the same name, and identical twin servants who also bear identical names…”
“We really should have identical twin servants…” his brother interjected.
“One ends up with his brother’s wife trying to bed him whilst he is enamoured of someone else,” Elladan ignored him, “who rejects him because she thinks he is a cheating husband and…”
“In such circumstances, mistaken identity,” Elrohir explained, “would never really happen.”
But his smile told a different story.
No Pleasure This
To celebrate his anniversary the King had asked for The Players to perform.
Faramir, studied the outline of the first play offered. A wizard, a storm, an island, attempted rape by ‘a deformed monstrous figure’…
He thought of Gandalf, friend of both King and Steward, now gone. Then came what he knew of the Queen’s mother; before his own nightmares crashed across his mind. Those vivid memories, borne in the blood, of great storm waves drowning all of Númenor.
If they came to him they must surely come to Aragorn.
“No,” he said, “Not this. Play out your Tempest elsewhere…”
(That drabble was inspired by The Brain Has Corridors by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wormwood_7 in which faramir has recurrent nightmares about the drowning of Numenor.)
Exit - Pursued by a What?
The Players had returned, pitching their travelling theatre on the Pelennor Fields, to the joy of the city’s citizens who politely forbore to recognise the party sitting near the front. Although the presence of the twin brothers of the King and Queen made it easy to guess who the plainly dressed, dark-haired, man might be.
The play was an odd confection. Described as comedy it seemed too solemn, until a moment of utter farce; a man lumbered across the stage, wearing a bearskin, chasing another.
Elladan whispered to his brothers, ‘You know, they really should enrol one of the Beornings*.’
Measure for Measure - Inch for Inch...
“They may be the best players in all Gondor – possibly in all Middle Earth,” Elladan said, “but I do wonder about the mind that comes up with some of the stories they tell.”
“For example,” he warmed to his subject, “I hope, Estel, you would never use such measure for measure as this play extols when you administer justice. I expected it to be about a wager; perhaps something about drinking wine measure for measure in competition.”
“Not then,” Elrohir asked with a smile, “about the measure for measure many ellyth wish to employ when they encounter us both naked?”
That Says It All
It seemed a perfectly good play to entertain the King on his one hundredth birthday, but Faramir knew there could be unsuitable twists in these Players’ entertainments. He would check with Legolas.
The summary amused Legolas – there seemed to be many parallels to the life of Aragorn, yet not; ‘unsuitable’ romance, a healer’s daughter, an heirloom ring… even a long journey. However, he reassured Faramir, he could see nothing to insult or embarrass the king.
“In fact,” he said, “that title, ‘All’s Well that Ends Well’, could be stitched, in mithril on silk, to form a new royal family motto.”
............
Disclaimer: The characters in this story do not belong to me, but are being used for amusement only, and all rights remain with the estate of JRR Tolkien.
............
The plays were - A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Comedy of Errors, The Tempest, The Winter's Tale, Measure for Measure, and All's Well that Ends Well.
*The Beornings are shape-changes best known for being able to assume the form of a bear.
I'm not sure if they are the first ever drabble set to cross Shakespeare with Middle Earth, but in them I imagine a copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare somehow having slipped between dimensions so that it now forms the repertoire of a troupe of travelling players in Middle Earth...
If you can't work out which play is which I will put a list at the end!
Rating G
Characters, apart from 'The Players'; Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Faramir, Elladan & Elrohir.
“There will be players,” Aragorn had said, and both his friends seemed pleased at the thought. But now they seemed uncomfortable, with odd glances back and forth between them, as on the stage the tale unfolded.
Obviously carefully chosen the play contained a royal wedding and, to honour the Queen, there were even ‘elves’.
These ‘elves’ were celebrating in a forest glade when, in their midst, appeared ‘non-elves’ who stumbled about, blindly, destroying the feast with their clumsiness.
Aragorn wished he knew why Legolas murmured, “They should be dwarves…” and Gimli harrumphed – but seemed to blush up to his ears.
“Let me get this straight…” Elladan began, “the players are telling a tale of identical twins who become separated by a shipwreck. Oh, and they both have the same name, and identical twin servants who also bear identical names…”
“We really should have identical twin servants…” his brother interjected.
“One ends up with his brother’s wife trying to bed him whilst he is enamoured of someone else,” Elladan ignored him, “who rejects him because she thinks he is a cheating husband and…”
“In such circumstances, mistaken identity,” Elrohir explained, “would never really happen.”
But his smile told a different story.
To celebrate his anniversary the King had asked for The Players to perform.
Faramir, studied the outline of the first play offered. A wizard, a storm, an island, attempted rape by ‘a deformed monstrous figure’…
He thought of Gandalf, friend of both King and Steward, now gone. Then came what he knew of the Queen’s mother; before his own nightmares crashed across his mind. Those vivid memories, borne in the blood, of great storm waves drowning all of Númenor.
If they came to him they must surely come to Aragorn.
“No,” he said, “Not this. Play out your Tempest elsewhere…”
(That drabble was inspired by The Brain Has Corridors by
wormwood_7 in which faramir has recurrent nightmares about the drowning of Numenor.)The Players had returned, pitching their travelling theatre on the Pelennor Fields, to the joy of the city’s citizens who politely forbore to recognise the party sitting near the front. Although the presence of the twin brothers of the King and Queen made it easy to guess who the plainly dressed, dark-haired, man might be.
The play was an odd confection. Described as comedy it seemed too solemn, until a moment of utter farce; a man lumbered across the stage, wearing a bearskin, chasing another.
Elladan whispered to his brothers, ‘You know, they really should enrol one of the Beornings*.’
“They may be the best players in all Gondor – possibly in all Middle Earth,” Elladan said, “but I do wonder about the mind that comes up with some of the stories they tell.”
“For example,” he warmed to his subject, “I hope, Estel, you would never use such measure for measure as this play extols when you administer justice. I expected it to be about a wager; perhaps something about drinking wine measure for measure in competition.”
“Not then,” Elrohir asked with a smile, “about the measure for measure many ellyth wish to employ when they encounter us both naked?”
It seemed a perfectly good play to entertain the King on his one hundredth birthday, but Faramir knew there could be unsuitable twists in these Players’ entertainments. He would check with Legolas.
The summary amused Legolas – there seemed to be many parallels to the life of Aragorn, yet not; ‘unsuitable’ romance, a healer’s daughter, an heirloom ring… even a long journey. However, he reassured Faramir, he could see nothing to insult or embarrass the king.
“In fact,” he said, “that title, ‘All’s Well that Ends Well’, could be stitched, in mithril on silk, to form a new royal family motto.”
............
Disclaimer: The characters in this story do not belong to me, but are being used for amusement only, and all rights remain with the estate of JRR Tolkien.
............
The plays were - A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Comedy of Errors, The Tempest, The Winter's Tale, Measure for Measure, and All's Well that Ends Well.
*The Beornings are shape-changes best known for being able to assume the form of a bear.
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no subject
Date: 24/09/2011 11:40 pm (UTC)I do feel Tinuviel could have slipped "We band of buggered" in there...
Nice - I particularly like the bemusement caused by AMND!
no subject
Date: 25/09/2011 08:52 am (UTC)As for "We band of buggered" - I could only use the prompts I was given. Actually it was the title, not the whole play, that was the prompt each week, if you see what I mean, and so they had to be titles that could be reinterpreted into any comedy of errors, or any midsummer night's dream.
Otherwise Henry would have worked well - and Macbeth might have been rather interesting too...
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