Blogging Shakespeare

Today, 22 May 2013, we celebrate the 200th birthday of one of the most iconic, controversial, and astonishingly original artists of all times: Richard Wagner (1813-1883). The eminent British musicologist Deryck Cooke declared that Wagner’s epic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) is the most ambitious work of art ever produced [...]

At the back of the stage were three panels showing images of old boys from 1913 onwards. I was aware of the St George’s flag being included as part of the design. As I peered more closely, I noticed that some of the photographs of the boys had a similar red cross of St George [...]

Richard Wagner’s engagement with his creative predecessor William Shakespeare began around age 13. At this time, Wagner pronounced Shakespeare’s name “Shicksper,” which triggered for him associations of fate (Shicksal = fate/destiny) and battle (Speer = spear). Wagner related this detail from the distant past to his second wife Cosima in 1874, who wrote it in [...]

Please would you make a recording of Sonnet 73 – a way of marking these chilly, windswept days full of falling (or fallen) leaves (‘or none, or few do hang’)? I’m just preparing to go to Weimar to give a key-note address to the annual gathering of the German Shakespeare Society. Their theme this time [...]

I saw Garrick Huscared last evening, the local artist and actor who is working on the new bust of Shakespeare, featured here a few weeks ago. As well as the new bust, he’s also making what’s turning out to be a star-studded film about the making of the original bust in Holy Trinity Church. It’s [...]

On the evening of the 17th of November this year, the RSC will perform Redcrosse in Coventry Cathedral. Partly an original arts event, partly a groundbreaking religious service, Redcrosse evolves out of a project I led to evolve a new questing liturgy for England and St George. It was inspired by one of the great [...]

This post is part of Year of Shakespeare, a project documenting the World Shakespeare Festival, the greatest celebration of Shakespeare the world has ever seen.   The Rape of Lucrece – Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh International Festival, 22nd September By Fionnuala O’Neill, University of Edinburgh Singer Camille O’Sullivan presumably did not expect her show suddenly to become [...]

This post is part of Year of Shakespeare, a project documenting the World Shakespeare Festival, the greatest celebration of Shakespeare the world has ever seen.   For me, the grand climax of the Year of Shakespeare came with a revival at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, of Elijah Moshinsky’s production of Verdi’s Otellowhich was first [...]

This post is part of Year of Shakespeare, a project documenting the World Shakespeare Festival, the greatest celebration of Shakespeare the world has ever seen.   Desdemona, dir. Peter Sellars, script by Toni Morrison, music by Rokia Traoré, 19 July 2012 at the Barbican, London By Erin Sullivan, Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham In her forward to [...]