Category Archives: Shakespeare’s World

Shakespeare’s spring

One of the greatest pleasures of spring in England is watching life returning over weeks or even months, beginning in gardens and parks with the blooming of snowdrops, moving on to daffodils, apple blossom and bluebells, to the mighty trees, … Continue reading

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Sir Walter Raleigh’s 400th anniversary

2018 marks 400 years since the death by execution of one of the most remarkable men of Shakespeare’s period, Sir Walter Raleigh. Raleigh is popularly known for bringing back the first potatoes from Virginia, for popularising tobacco, and for placing … Continue reading

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Fireworks for Queen Elizabeth

One of the most famous legends of Shakespeare’s life is the story that Shakespeare might have attended some of the celebrations that accompanied Queen Elizabeth 1’s visit to Kenilworth Castle in 1575. It would have been easy for the 11-year … Continue reading

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Angles on Shakespeare in Stratford 2018

There’s never any shortage of Shakespeare-related events in Stratford, not just performances at the Royal Shakespeare Company or activities at the Shakespeare properties managed by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. At the moment, in February-March 2018, there is a flurry of … Continue reading

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A new source for Shakespeare’s plays?

It’s always exciting when someone claims to have made a new discovery relating to Shakespeare and the writing of his plays. The sources of most of his work are well known: Geoffrey Bullough’s Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare, published … Continue reading

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Shakespeare and the monarchy

The BBC is currently running a Royal Collection season, focusing on the million or so objects owned by British royalty. Many are priceless artefacts, but the Collection also includes objects with extraordinary symbolic and cultural value to the nation. Some … Continue reading

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Plough Monday and Distaff Day

Although Christmas is well past, it’s been only a week since many people got  back to normal, so attached are the English to festivities at the turn of the year. It’s not a new phenomenon. From Elizabethan times, and probably … Continue reading

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Ovid and Shakespeare: the world’s greatest storytellers

Anyone who’s interested in Shakespeare will have heard the name Ovid, but how much do we really know about him? I’ve written a couple of posts on Ovid myself, but I have never really investigated the story of this great … Continue reading

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The importance of image: Martin Luther and the 95 Theses

It’s one of the most famous of images: a simply dressed monk takes a hammer and nails, the symbols of the crucifixion of Christ, and fixes a large document to the wooden door of a church. The date was 31 … Continue reading

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Shakespeare: Print and Performance

For many years, even centuries, there was a huge divide between Shakespeare’s plays as they were performed and how they appeared in print. Scholars wrestled with the numerous different editions of the plays issued in the early modern period, trying … Continue reading

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