We were fortunate to have two movies shown at the zoo this long weekend – All Is True and Tolkien. The first is about William Shakespeare and his home situation, with Dame Judi Dench playing Anne Hathaway most splendidly. This monkey found the film intriguing – especially the focus on Shakespeare’s attachment to his young son Hamnet and the cause of Hamnet’s death.

Apparently, some scholars believe that the 1596 death from an unknown illness of Shakespeare’s eleven year-old son prompted the dark tone in the playwright’s later works. Other scholars think that the death of Shakespeare’s father in 1601—the same year he wrote Hamlet—inspired his exploration of a grieving son.

I agree with the scholar who stated: “Shakespeare spoke what the whole world knows but cannot express”.

The second film was a study of the author of Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien. Michael White, (page 84) in his biography of Tolkein, believes that Tolkein had ambivalent feelings towards the Roman Catholic Church, to which he, ironically, remained most loyal. The harsh treatment of his mother, who converted to Roman Catholicism, by her Protestant relatives, caused him to create a pre-Christian mythology in his famous works.

I wonder if scholars in the future will postulate learned reasons why I, Chugley, The Writing Chimpanzee, wrote my blog.

Gibber! Gibber!

Chugley

The Movie Enthusiast Chimp