Blogging Shakespeare

The Plays We Overlook: Love’s Labour’s Lost By James Cappio Why isn’t Love’s Labour’s Lost more popular? Perhaps this “feast of language” is a surfeit for some. Where A Midsummer Night’s Dream has but two romantic couples, Love’s Labour’s Lost has four, plus a love triangle. Where Much Ado About Nothing has but Dogberry and […]

Shakespeare has mattered ever since his name first appeared in print in 1593 with his erotic and entertaining poem, Venus and Adonis. He was 29 years old. For much of the poem the goddess of love is naked and begging for sex before Adonis, but he resists her advances. Venus and Adonis was a sensation […]

On Saturday 30 November, The British Shakespeare Association pays tribute to two excellent and contrasting Shakespeare scholars by making them Honorary Fellows: Professors Terence Hawkes and Stanley Wells. There will be a special gathering here at The Shakespeare Centre, Henley Street from 10.00am during which a series of short talks and reflections on both Terry’s […]

In the Raspberry Hills Library English Book Circle the question has often been raised of how much we can accept things done to the classics. Can Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law really do that to Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson?  Can Laurie R. King really have a feisty young Marry Russell marry an aging […]

Love’s Labour’s Lost, many people think was written for a performance at the Inns of Court – this is because it’s most striking feature is its focus on intellectual comedy. This is the polar opposite of a play like Titus Andronicus with its multiple murders and blood and guts enough to please the most sensation […]

Dear Kenneth Branagh, Do you know how it is to see a movie that hits you like a ton of bricks and changes your life? Well, of course you do. Your Henry V did that to me. The first time I saw it I was only as vaguely aware of Shakespeare as most people are […]

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.   Plays as Music at Globe to Globe By Amy Kenny, University of Sussex When asked how his company rehearsed for their Globe to Globe production of Twelfth Night, Atul Kumar, […]

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.   Circles, Centres, and the Globe to Globe Festival By Stephen Purcell, University of Warwick At a meeting of the Year of Shakespeare contributors last week, I found myself thinking about […]

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 Comedy of Errors, Roy-e-Sabs, dir.  Corinne Jaber, 31 May 2012 at The Globe, London By Stephen Purcell, University of Warwick At the beginning of Roy-e-Sabs’ production of The Comedy of Errors, the Afghan […]