Download a sample chapter from my new project Now You Know Shakespeare!

From the Coming Soon page:

The problem as I see it is that there are thousands of books that will teach you about Shakespeare, but they all assume that you either know everything, or nothing. Either you’re researching your PhD thesis on Merry Wives of Windsor, or you just want to pass your Hamlet test next week. What about everyone in between? What about the average educated adult who would like to read up on Shakespeare to fill in the gaps she missed in school?

I’d like to do something about that. I’m starting a new book series I’m calling Now You Know Shakespeare that aims squarely at this audience, and makes no claims otherwise. I’ve met too many adults that want to come back to Shakespeare, but don’t know where to start and are afraid to jump in somewhere between the shallow and deep ends. I recently spoke with an elementary school teacher who was excited about a production of The Tempest coming to Boston, and asked me to recommend something she could read that could bring her up to speed on the play so she wasn’t going in cold. What could I say? She wasn’t a kid, or a dummy, or “the masses” or “middle school” or any of the other audiences I get when I google the expression “Shakespeare for” and see how Google autocompletes it for me. She needed more than the one-page summary she was going to get in the Playbill, but she wasn’t going to sit down to 400 pages of footnotes about the play, either.

They say that if you see a need you should fill that need. Well, I see a need and I’m going to try my best to fill it.

If you’d like to get an early look at what I’m talking about, follow the link and sign up to download your free sample. I apologize for the “coming soon” nature of the site, but it was very important for me to get this link up for Shakespeare Day and as you’re probably noticing I had about 25 other balls in the air approaching the big day.  This is a preview of what’s to come, and I’m not going to release the final product until the quality is where it should be.  But I’m excited for everybody to see it!

This year’s Shakespeare posting marathon is sponsored by “Shakespeare is Universal.” Help us prove that Shakespeare makes life better. Buy a t-shirt and support cancer research.

Earlier this year I spoke about Shakespeare to my daughter’s fourth grade (9yr old) class, and I have to say that it was the best experience I’ve yet had. Just the right combination of attention span, interest level, and academic proficiency (i.e. they could read and pay attention :)). I heard that after I left and they went to their library hour, kids were looking for Shakespeare books.

I’m happy to report that I’m doing it again!

Every year this particular fourth grade classroom performs a play, based on a book that they read that year. The script, I believe, is written by the teacher. When I told her that I had more material that involved getting the kids up out of the seats and performing some Shakespeare, she suggested that maybe we could use it as an in-class exercise to help kids get over their shyness about speaking in public.

Happy to do it! Next week for the first time I’m going straight into a class that already knows me, already knows my subject, and has already heard most of my canned material. I get a blank slate!  I’m thinking about bringing kids up to act out Gertrude’s bedroom scene from Hamlet or something similarly exciting.  Mostly for the yelling and the stabbing. Get their interest right away. No monologuing.

I’ve also got a project I worked up for my son’s class and never got to use, where each kid gets a line from Henry V’s “band of brothers” speech. First, though, I show them Kenneth Branagh performing the speech, to see why it’s a big deal.  Then I tell them to do it like that, and let them have at it.  No idea how that’ll work, but it’s sure a great place to work on projecting from your diaphragm.

This year’s Shakespeare posting marathon is sponsored by “Shakespeare is Universal.” Help us prove that Shakespeare makes life better. Buy a t-shirt and support cancer research.

I love the potential for Shakespeare sequels and prequels. Once upon a time we played the “write a sequel” game, I highly suggest checking that out for Alexi’s genius crossover idea that blends a Merchant of Venice sequel into an Othello prequel.  There’s also Hamlet 2, which is a bit of a joke but does have an actual plot in there somewhere, and I’m pretty sure there’s a legit sequel called “Fortinbras” or “Horatio” (I think the latter) that has Horatio haunted by the ghosts of everybody that died in the first one.

In 2010 Christopher Plummer announced that The Tempest would be his farewell to Shakespeare, because he had reached an age where there were literally no more parts left for him to play.

Are we going to lose Helen Mirren as well? She’s played Cleopatra and Lady M, but at 67 years old what else should she play?  She did get that chance to play a female Prospero in Julie Taymor’s movie.

It’s a good question. The men of course have Lear, Prospero, Polonius, Falstaff, Gloucester… the list goes on. Although, granted, if you start a list with “Lear” it’s going to drop off pretty quickly.

How about Volumnia? That seems an obvious choice. Any others?

This year’s Shakespeare posting marathon is sponsored by “Shakespeare is Universal.” Help us prove that Shakespeare makes life better. Buy a t-shirt and support cancer research.

Any list of “Things You Didn’t Know About Shakespeare” usually comes up lacking, but I have to admit that I learned several new things this time. That is, assuming that these are all true and not apocryphal.

Sure, we all knew that Shakespeare had twins, one of whom died. And the story with the starlings, although I still believe that one is fake.  Not that he released the starlings, that’s true – but that it had anything to do with Shakespeare. I find no proof of that, and I’ve looked.

But did I know that Hitler designed a Shakespeare play? Or that the first amateur performance was in 1623? Or that Mozart tried his hand at The Tempest? All news to me!  A very interesting list indeed.