Steve Lyons

“The day shall not be up so soon as I, to try the fair adventure of tomorrow,” says bright-eyed, 13-year-old Asa Burritt, sounding a bit like one of his idol’s characters.

“Oh, well,” he tells me, “It is a direct quote.” I see. Asa has been studying Shakespeare for the last 2 years with classmate Calla Smith under the enthusiastic, ‘I’m crazy about Shakespeare,’ tutelage of Vision teacher Jane McGarry. His scholarship is leading him to a fair adventure, although it isn’t tomorrow.

Jane’s love of the bard is obviously infectious; the kids have read eleven of his plays and quote impressive passages, with feeling, at the drop of a question. When Jane tells me the students have worked “really hard” on Shakespeare, fourteen-year-old Calla says “Study is like the heaven’s glorious sun that will not be deep-searched with saucy looks,” and gives a hearty laugh. It’s a quote from Shakespeare’s Loves Labors Lost.

If all goes well, heaven’s glorious sun will shine on the three as they cross the sea to the birthplace and haunts of the genius they admire. Jane, Calla and Asa have their sights set on seeing plays in Shakespeare’s own theater, the Globe, which is on the south side of the Thames River in London. It’s not the original Globe, the one Shakespeare owned with a handful of partners. That one burned down. This one is a meticulously crafted reproduction built near the original spot.

Jane shows me a poster-sized color photo of the Globe hanging on her living room wall. She points out the authentic features like the mortise and tenon joints and the thatched roof. She also has a hat-sized, three-dimensional paper model of the open-air theater on her dining room table. She opens it to give me a cutaway view of the stage and seating.

When I ask Asa who his favorite character is, he tells me it is Puck from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and reels off a passage. Why Puck?
“He’s a mischievous satyr who takes delight in watching humans get in trouble,” he says with a puckish grin.

Calla’s favorite is on the opposite end of the personality spectrum. “I like Shylock from The Merchant of Venice” she says. “He’s a mean and nasty man who is trodden upon and he wants revenge. He has compelling arguments and your sense of injustice is aroused.” She then recites Shylock’s speech, the one in which he argues that the pound of his debtor’s flesh, which is rightfully owed to him, be forthcoming.

Getting three people to England is not cheap. The trio are using their wits and skills to come up with the finances. “For I did dream of moneybags tonight,” Calla says, quoting Shylock again. In addition to dreaming, she is selling beaded jewelry, which she makes herself, and doing work around the house to raise money. If you were around her family’s garden this summer, you’d have heard her lilting voice reciting her favorite Shakespeare passages as she plucked the weeds.

Asa breaks down boxes at Hardin’s Natural Foods in Hotchkiss to make bucks. All three of them sold baked goods at the Mountain Harvest Festival (the brownies were super, I can attest), and are planning to sell homemade truffles or craft items at the Holiday Art Fair in Paonia. So far they’ve raised about a third of the estimated $8,000 they need.

They are applying for assistance from the Cocker Kids Foundation and are seeking special Vision funds, too. Even so, getting all the money is a big stretch. The group could use a benefactor “ I must entreat of you some of that money,” says Asa, holding out his open palm to me as he assumes the persona of the beseeching Antonio in the play Twelfth Night.

“For I can raise no money by vile means,” says Calla lifting her chin dramatically, as she quotes Brutus in Julius Caesar. “By heaven, I had rather coin my heart and drop my blood for drachmas.” Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

If you have deep pockets and would like to cast a few drachmas in their direction, they would be most grateful. You might even get some flattery out of it. “You, great benefactors,” says Calla striking an orators pose as she quotes Timmons of Athens, “sprinkle our society with thankfulness. For your own gifts make yourselves praised.”

Why should anyone give money to support this scholarly endeavor? “We need more thespians in our community,” says Asa matter of factly. Sounds good to me.

If you are so inclined, you can send drachmas, precious jewels, gold coins, moneybags, plain old greenbacks or even a check, with wishes of “God speed,” to TLC (a non-profit educational organization) P.O. Box 663, Paonia, CO 81428.