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William Shakespeare: The Lost Interview

Marc Green


William Shakespeare is mainly known as the writer of plays and poems. However, a startling discovery at the Bodlean Library in Oxford throws an entire new light on his work. A janitor cleaning the bowels of the library discovered a musty manuscript of the only interview that Shakespeare ever gave. It reveals that his plays and poems were just a sideline. He was really a human factors safety expert - possibly the world's first. Of course, "The Human Factors And Ergonomic Society Journal" and "Accident prevention And Analysis", etc. did not yet exist, so he was saved from writing long-winded academic papers. Instead, he cleverly put his research about error, accidents, expectation, distraction and warnings in the form of plays and sonnets, where they lay unrecognized for centuries. Until now. Here is a transcript of the interview:

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Hi, it's October 3, 1610. I'm in Stratford-On-Avon Arms with William Shakespeare, the well-known human factors safety expert. Mr. Shakespeare - may I call you Will - why do you write so much about human factors safety?

Nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.1

Do accidents sometimes occur because people make consciously controlled decisions?

Men at some time are masters of their fate.2

What is automatic behavior?

What men daily do, not knowing what they do!3

What causes automatic behavior to develop?

Use doth breed a habit in a man.4

So most people act on expectation?

Our expectation that it would be thus. Hath made us forward.5

Can unconscious habits cause accidents when the situation varies unexpectedly?

Costly thy habit.6 Oft expectation fails, and most oft there where it most promises.7

You've said that expectation can cause a phenomenon called "inattentional blindness". What happens to people when this occurs?

They behold, and see not what they see.8

When are people most likely to miss important information?

When men are unprepared and look not for it.9

People generally see what they expect to see because perception comes partly from information stored in memory?

Then have you lost a sight, which was to be seen10
The mind and sight distractedly commix'd.11

Can inattentional blindness lead to serious accidents?

Blind sight, dead life.12

What is the best way to combat inattentional blindness?

We must extend our notice.13

How do we do that?

Show more goodly and attract more eyes.14

Don't people more often notice what is relevant to their goals. What's the best way to find out what's relevant?

Ask him his purposes, why he appears.15

You have investigated accidents caused by impaired coachmen and riders who were not looking at the highway. Why did they cause accidents?

They stared, and were distracted; no man's life
Was to be trusted with them.16

I've heard that some even write the text of plays while driving. Why would they do that?

For society saith the text is
the happiness of life.17

Is that safe? Do you think a person should continue the practice?

No more! The text is foolish.18 In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much like to madness.19

Why is that?

Men's eyes were made to look, and let them gaze.20 Gaze where you should, and that will clear your sight.21

Can people become distracted internally due to mind wandering?

sometimes they do extend
Their view right on; anon their gazes lend
To every place at once, and, nowhere fix'd.22

Can too much ale also affect driving and lead to horse-horse collisions?

That quaffing and drinking will undo you.23

Could it also lead to horse-pedestrian accidents?

I do not without danger walk these streets.24

What about fatigue? Is it a problem if people ride too long or lack sleep?

For, now they are oppress'd with travel, they
Will not, nor cannot, use such vigilance
As when they are fresh.25

Let's talk about warnings. How would you warn of potential hazards?

I'll by a sign give notice.26

You find warning signs useful because they...

Admonish me give me signs of future accidents. 27

Do you think warnings work best when the user already perceives the risk?

Best safety lies in fear.28

But don't people ignore warnings when the cost of compliance is high?

The fashion of the world is to avoid cost. 29

What is your advice on warning design?

Take heed, be wary how you place your words.30 Tis better to be brief than tedious.31 An honest tale speeds best, being plainly told. 32

OK, people don't like to read long warnings, but isn't there also a danger in crying wolf, exaggerating the hazard by inflating accident statistics?

Thy overflow of good converts to bad. 33 It's not enough to speak, but to speak true.34

In order to reduce accidents and improve safety, what must we learn?

What error drives our eyes and ears amiss.
Until I know this sure uncertainty,
I'll entertain the offer'd fallacy. 35

What is the best way to learn this?

Let us breathe and haply institute a course of learning and ingenious studies.36

What should be the goal of studies into user safety?

To make inquire of his behavior.37

Should we do this through surveys and asking people what they might do in the future or should we measure actual behavior?

Talking isn't doing.
It is a kind of good deed to say well;
and yet words are not deeds.38

So you think that people just give socially acceptable answers in surveys. But aren't behavior research studies in journals conducted under conditions that limit their ecological validity?

I embrace these conditions; let us have articles.39 I yet remember Some of these articles.40

What kind of articles did you read? What about epidemiological studies by people who know little about human behavior and only use disembodied accident statistics?

Mine eyes did sicken at the sight, and could not
Endure a further view.41

Do you put much faith in a safety program like the Stratford-On-Avon Vision Zero?

A comedy of errors. Much Ado about nothing. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.42

Why is that?

I find the people strangely fantasied,
Possessed with rumors, full of idle dreams.43

On a personal note, I've heard that you appear in the royal court and give opinions on beholding distance and rider beholding-reining time.

Why, here is the note of the fashion to testify.44

It sounds like you have created a new profession. Maybe we could call being a "expert witness". Do you enjoy the work?

He that is well paid is well satisfied.45

Will thanks for taking the trouble to come up to meet me here in Stratford for this interview.

Would I were in an alehouse in London.46

Don't leave. It's 5:30 so they are serving half-priced Ale and snacks here right now.

You have stayed me in a happy hour.47

Good. I hope that we can get together and do another interview real soon.

Wishers were ever fools.48

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It should really be no surprise that Shakespeare was an expert of human factors safety. After all, he is generally acknowledged to be an expert on human nature. And as someone would say three centuries later, "We shall understand accidents when we understand human nature."

Endnotes

1Henry IV, Part I [I, 2]
2Julius Caesar[I, 2]
3Much Ado about Nothing [IV, 1]
4Two Gentlemen of Verona [V, 4]
5Cymbeline[III, 5]
6Hamlet[I, 3]
7All's Well That Ends Well[II, 1]
8Sonnet 137
9Richard III[III, 2] 10Winter's Tale[V, 2]
11Lover's Complaint
12Richard III[IV, 4]
13Cymbeline[II, 3]
14Henry IV, Part I[I, 2]
15King Lear[V, 3]
16Macbeth[II, 3]
17Love's Labour's Lost[IV, 2]
18King Lear[IV, 2]
19Measure for Measure[IV, 4]
20Romeo and Juliet[III, 1]
21Comedy of Errors[III, 2]
22Lover's Complaint
23Twelfth Night[I, 3]
24Twelfth Night[III, 3]
25Tempest[III, 3]
26Henry VI, Part I[III, 2]
27Henry VI, Part I[V, 3]
28Hamlet[I, 3]
29Much Ado about Nothing[I, 1]
30Henry VI, Part I[III, 2]
31Richard III[I, 4]
32Richard III[IV, 4]
33Richard II[V, 3]
34Midsummer Night's Dream[V, 1]
35Comedy of Errors[II, 2]
36Taming of the Shrew[I, 1]
37Hamlet[II, 1]
38Henry VIII[III, 2]
39Cymbeline[I, 4]
40Henry VIII[III, 2]
41Antony and Cleopatra [III, 10]
42Macbeth[V, 5]
43King John[4, 2]
44Two Gentlemen of Verona[I, 1]
45Merchant of Venice[IV, I]
46Henry V[III, 2]
47Much Ado about Nothing[IV, 1]
48Antony and Cleopatra[4, IV]


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