Star-crossed Love Islanders! Shakespeare ‘would have been a fan’ of tawdry TV show
IT’S the trashy TV show that has won an unlikely following among the middle classes, and now Love Island has been compared to Shakespeare for its canoodling contestants’ inventive use of language.
Millions of viewers have become hooked on the trials and tribulations of the show’s star-crossed lovers – and, according to one author, even the Bard of Avon would have been a fan.
For, not only do the Love Islanders change partners more often than a Elizabethan comedy, they also continue Shakespeare’s ‘noble tradition’ of creating new words and phrases, says novelist and broadcaster Elizabeth Day in the Radio Times.
Literature experts might find her suggestion sacrilegious, given that the contestants’ sometimes baffling vocabulary is hardly sophisticated.
The contestants’ favourite words include ‘grafting’ – getting someone to like you – and ‘salty’ – being angry towards someone. They have even come up with their own rather tawdry phrases
‘A whole new lexicon’
for sex, such as ‘dusting’ and ‘putting the carrot in the hummus’.
But Miss Day insisted: ‘Shakespeare is said to have invented more than 1,700 of our common words by changing nouns into verbs, changing verbs into adjectives, connecting words never before used together, adding prefixes and suffixes, or simply making them up from scratch.
‘The Love Islanders continue this noble tradition in some style. I’ve been introduced to a whole new lexicon, including “melt”, “muggy” and “pied off”.’
The ITV2 show follows young singletons who are left in a villa in Majorca under constant surveillance – with nightvision cameras filming their bedroom antics.
To stay in the competition, they have to complete explicit challenges and form relationships – but the couples frequently change, with a continuous process of dating, break-ups and recoupling.
The winning pair, as voted by the public, will win £50,000.
But despite the Islanders’ Xrated antics, viewers have been complaining more often about the programme showing smoking than the sex scenes.
However, Miss Day thinks that watching the programme can ‘actually make you more civilised’, as it puts a spotlight on each contestant’s ‘quest to be understood’.
She added: ‘Of course there’s lots of fake tan and white teeth and preposterous, siliconeenhanced body types, and the occasional night-time shuffle under the sheets.
‘But at its heart, Love Island is a show about people forming relationships – romantic ones, yes, but also platonic ones. ’
In addition to her bold suggestion that Shakespeare would have enjoyed the series, the author also sought to convince Jane Austen fans to give it a go. She said: ‘It’s the kind of narrative that has obsessed us since time immemorial.
‘It’s why we’re still riveted by the work of Jane Austen or Shakespeare: because we are all searching for someone who helps us make sense of ourselves.
‘Before the sun sets on Love Island … I urge you to give it a go. Shakespeare, ever the populist, would love it.’
The seven-week series is now in its final fortnight, with the final shown in the week of July 24.