Blogging Shakespeare

Back in November I attended a fascinating one day conference at the University of Chichester about Shakespearian theories. Professor Tiffany Stern (University College, Oxford) gave a splendidly candid paper which cast doubt over there being any Shakespearian connection with the so-called lost play Cardenio. It’s a compelling and involved argument which in part relied on […]

The Shakespeare Bookshop was pleased to have had a work experience student from King Edward VI, Amardeep Dhillon, who volunteered two days of his time to see how the shop is run. Amar was an asset to the shop during his time with us, and was most helpful with running the book stall during the […]

The Centre has been a hive of activity this week with students from around the country debating all things Shakespearian in our “Great Shakespeare Debate”, run in conjunction with The English Speaking Union. Our teaching rooms, corridors and stairwells have been humming with the buzz and whistle of racing minds, and tripping tongues. The students […]

So, if Shakespeare himself wasn’t the first great Shakespeare actor (see my earlier blog), who was? The answer must be Richard Burbage. We know all too little about the actors of Shakespeare’s company, but Burbage was among the founder members of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men and stayed with the company through its transition into the […]

Guest Blog from Andrew Cowie (pictured) The first Shakespeare play ever saw was an amateur production at the Barn Theatre in Welwyn Garden City. It was King Lear and we went on a school trip to the nearest, and cheapest, production our teacher could find. One of the first plays I was in was an […]

  I’m just back from the very enjoyable conference I wrote about in my last blog, ‘Where has all the Verse Gone? Shakespeare’s Poetry on the Page and on the Stage’, hosted by U.C.L.A. (13-14 May). There can be few events which are more deeply satisfying to an enquiring mind than a really good gathering […]

A Blogversation between Matt Kubus and Yolana Wassersug: Matt: We all know that had it not been for Gonzalo, who ‘furnished [Prospero] from [his] own library with volumes that [he] prized,’ Prospero would have been marooned on the island without the ability to perform any magic. He couldn’t have enslaved Caliban, freed Ariel, or instructed […]

Summer will soon be upon us, and so too will a plethora of touring productions of Shakespeare’s plays.  Shakespeare ‘al fresco’ is as much a part of British summertime as strawberries…. rain…… and unbecoming shorts.  It is little surprise that Shakespeare’s plays can take to the road with such ease – you don’t need a […]

On Tuesday morning I had the pleasure of a second meeting with Fiona Lindsay and some of the team from Digital Theatre. I don’t know if you have heard about Digital Theatre but basically it is a digitisation project which makes live theatre available on line with a range of supplementry materials also available. This […]

A few days ago our Head of Education and Research, Paul Edmondson, and I paid a fascinating visit to Magdalen College School, Oxford. We had been invited by members of the English department to take classes with the Upper Sixth Form and to give a couple of talks to larger groups of students. We already […]