Shakespeare's birthday

Today is Shakespeare's birthday. Yesterday (and perhaps today) the Globe Theatre had a whole range of special events and free entry into the Globe. My visiting friend and I who were in the area to visit the Tate Modern, decided to go to see the bard's festivities upon rather convincing cajolement from a Globe employee rounding up tourists along the Thames walk.



We tried on outfits from Shakespeare plays.


I am a centurion

We took a class on reading verse (and by the way you've never heard Hamlet's "to be or not to be..." soliloquy until you've heard it done quite dramatically by a young Polish woman.) All of us in the class split up the lines, I got:

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

Th' oppressor's wrong,

My friend, Q-Vol, got:

ay, there's the rub,

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause.

I'm not sure I learned much, but I am going to try to have more dramatic pauses in my speeches. I did have an ulterior motive for attending this workshop - I wanted validation for the rather heavy-handed Shakespearean way I recited Marc Antony's speech (Friends, Romans, countrymen...) as required in Sophomore English.

My teacher said: What kind of accent is that?
I said: A Shakespearean accent. You know like the records. (The recordings of various chunks of Julius Caesar, where I swear they all camply enunciated and rolled Rs and overacted)
She said: Just say it normal

.

Hmmph. Anyway, apparently this class on Shakespeare readings was in line with my Sophomore teacher. When Miss Poland was all outraaaa-gee-ous four-tune. Giles, our instructor said "just try to let it flow out normally. Normal speech".


We did not get to strut and fret our hour upon the stage