tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Nov 06 08:18:21 1996
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Armin Shimerman and Hamlet
- From: "Mark E. Shoulson" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Armin Shimerman and Hamlet
- Date: Wed, 6 Nov 1996 11:18:20 -0500 (EST)
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Well, folks, we have some really nice news.
As you may remember, I won a trip to the Star Trek 30th Anniversary bash in
Hunstville, AL in early September. I was supposed to bring some KLI
paraphernalia to give to people there, but unfortunately the box from
Lawrence arrived too late. But I *did* have an extra copy of Hamlet, which
I was instructed to give to Armin Shimerman (if at all possible).
Mr. Shimerman, in case you didn't recognize the name, plays Quark on DS9
and is also a major Shakespeare fan.
Things did not go ideally; I never got within striking distance of the
man. However, my wife exchanged a sentence or two with him when she was
getting his autograph (I was getting other autographs at the time), and she
told him I had a Klingon _Hamlet_ for him. She says he was *very* excited
and anxious to see it. The next day, at another autograph signing, Deborah
Kay (hi there!), who also knew about all this, saw him and asked if he had
gotten the book yet, and he said "No, but I really want to see it!!" He
was definitely excited, but the place was so busy....
At any rate, I was determined not to pass this opportunity up. The people
who ran the contest (LA Promo. Nice folks; use them next time you have a
multi-million-dollar promotion) said that Mr. Shimerman comes by to their
town every so often, for the Shakespeare society. They said they could get
the book to him. So I took a sheet of paper and wrote a nice long (and
rather windy) letter to Mr. Shimerman and handed it over with the book and
crossed my fingers.
A few weeks later, and nothing heard. I wrote to the LA Promo people, to
see what was up. No response. Then, the other day, I get a letter in the
mail... from Armin Shimerman. I here reprint it, with a little markup to
give you an idea of his emphasis.
I think we can be quite, quote proud.
~mark
=====================
October 30, 1996
Dear Mark,
First off, I am awed by the magnitude of your dedication and scholarship -
congratulations. I just received your book yesterday and have not had the
time to really scrutinize the work that you have done, but the sheer size of
the task you set before you had to be heroically challenging and you
accomplished it. Bravo! You have married the two passions of my life - Star
Trek and Shakespeare - in one project. The _Klingon version of Hamlet_
will sit proudly as well as prominently on my bookshelf and I guarantee you
all my friends will see it. This is all prologue for my saying <bold>Thank-you
so very much</bold> for sending me a copy. I am itching to explore it.
Please pass my congratulations on to the other members of the Klingon
Language Institute for their participation in this project. But most of all
thank your kind wife for making this possible for me. I have studied
Shakespeare for most of my life and can understand what you mean when you say
"all the translators gained a deeper appreciation of Shakespeare in creating
this book." The genius of the writing can only be really valued by close
examination of the text and the reflection that follows. Now that you have
done that, I'm sure we share a common passion. Once again thank-you for the
hard work done and the passions that drove it on to completion.
Sincerely,
Armin Shimerman (signed)
Armin Shimerman
PS. It may be of interest to you to know that Bob O'Reilly and I did a
"version" of Hamlet together many years ago. He was Fortinbras and I was
Polonius.
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