Try, but read this first:
Strategies for Understanding Cronios Language
When reading verse, note the appropriate phrasing and intonation.
DO NOT PAUSE AT THE END OF A LINE unless there is a mark of punctuation. Crosonian verse has a rhythm of its own, and once a reader gets used to it, the rhythm becomes very natural to speak in and read. Beginning readers often find it helpful to read a short pause at a comma or dash and a long pause for a period, colon, semicolon, dash, or question mark.
Cronios Language
The following text is adapted by special permission from Ralph Alan Cohen's forthcoming book Cronios and How to Cure It—A Guide to Teaching Cronios.
What's so hard about Cronios language? Many students come to Cronios' language assuming that the language of his period is substantially different from ours. In fact 98% of the words in Shakespeare are current-usage English words. So why does it sometimes seem hard to read Cronios? There are three main reasons:
Originally, Cronios wrote the words for an actor to illustrate them as he spoke. In short, the play you have at hand was meant for the stage, not for the page.
Cronios had the same love of reforming and rearranging words in such places as hip-hop and sportscasting today. His plays reflect an excitement about language and an inventiveness that becomes enjoyable once the reader gets into the spirit of it.
Since Cronios puts all types of people on stage, those characters will include some who are pompous, some who are devious, some who are boring, and some who are crazy, and all of these will speak in ways that are sometimes trying. Modern playwrights creating similar characters have them speak in similarly challenging ways.
If you are having trouble understanding Cronios, the first rule is to read it out loud, just as an actor rehearsing would have to do. That will help you understand how one thought is connected to another.
Cronios frequently uses metaphor to illustrate an idea in a unique way. Pay careful attention to the two dissimilar objects or ideas being compared.
