Dating Shakespearian characters and learning The Handshake.

I live in a hamlet in North Yorkshire.  There's probably about seventy other people in here with me, which is quite a lot to fit inside even a major Shakespearian character, particularly with all the madness and the murder and stuff.  I suppose it could be worse, some of my friends live in an othello just down the road, and are sick of finding hankies all over the place.  And waking up to find that you've moved into a juliet is only going to invite lewd jokes and hand gestures, and you'll NEVER be able to invite the in laws round.

Which brings me to my point of the day.  If you had to date a Shakespearian character, which one would you want to go out with?  I'd probably plump for Banquo's Ghost, who sounds like he might be up for a jolly time, and at least you'd only have to pay for one of you to get into clubs and concerts.  Plus he wouldn't eat much, so he'd be a really cheap date as long as you could put up with all the insubstantial stuff and the moaning and everything.  Either him or one of the minor ones.  I mean, going back to Hamlet again, what about Osric?  A Courtier?  He's going to be really grateful for any attention, isn't he?  Which, in turn, is going to mean lots of flowers and chocolates and pathetic gratitude whenever you take him out, like a dog which has been allowed into Hotel Chocolat.

Any takers for Macbeth?  Anyone?  Look, he's quite handsome if you ignore the blood and the knife and... okay, yes, I see your point.  You're probably better off with the witches.

Yes, I know it's unfashionable to be seen out with anyone from Shakespeare's oevre (no, not his egg, that's an oeuf.  Anyway, what the hell would I mean about you being seen out with anyone from Shakespeare's egg?  That doesn't mean anything).  Most of them are doomed to being overly 'amusing' ...yes, Falstaff, I'm looking at you, you and your drunken 'jokes', or just plain doomed.  Getting friendly with some boozed up overweight guy who cracks semi-witticisms would be just like hanging round the nightclubs in Sheffield or Hull, and going out with some of the doomier ones would be like dating a Sixth Former, all that angst and woe and bad poetry.

Angst and woe but at least his poetry rhymes.  And he isn't in Sixth form.  At least, not the one I work at. Sigh.

Oh.  And in Other News.... Kate Johnson (who is a friend of mine, well, I say 'friend', she hasn't bitten me yet or had me committed, so that's a positive sign isn't it?) has just been offered a contract with those wonderful people at Choc Lit!  So she'll be One of Us!  We'll have to teach her the Handshake, obviously, and the Walk, but after she's got those down, her Untied Kingdom novel will be one to watch for.  And so will she, if she's doing the Handshake and the Walk at the same time...