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Cobbe Portrait of William Shakespeare
Monthly Archives: April 2012
In Honor of the Bard’s Birthday
A Shakespeare Miscellany In Honor of the Bard’s Birthday From The Huffington Post: To celebrate Shakespeare’s birthday, we’re featuring some of our favorite archival pieces about his life and work. This one was first published in July 2005. Happy Birthday, … Continue reading
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“I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,/Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,/Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,/With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine.”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act Two, Part Three By Dennis Abrams ————————————– From Harold Bloom: “Doubtless Shakespeare remembered that in Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene Oberon was the benevolent father of Gloriana, who in the allegory of Spenser’s great epic … Continue reading
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Tagged A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act Two, changeling, Comedy, literature, Oberon, Puck, renaissance humanism, Shakespeare, Titania, William Shakespeare
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“But she, being mortal, of that boy did die”
A Midnight Summer’s Night Dream Act Two, Part Two By Dennis Abrams ———————————————— From Garber: “’Am not I Hermia? Are not you Lysander?’ This is Hermia’s question in the middle of the play, act 3, scene 2, when the play’s … Continue reading
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Tagged A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act Two, changeling, Comedy, Fairy Queen, literature, Oberon, Puck, renaissance humanism, Shakespeare, Titania, William Shakespeare
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“I’ll put a girdle round about the earth/In forty minutes.”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act Two, Part One By Dennis Abrams ————————– Act Two: In the woods, Oberon and Titania bicker over a boy in Titania’s service, whom Oberon wants as an attendant. When Titania refuses, Oberon plots revenge, sending … Continue reading
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Tagged A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act Two, Comedy, Demetrius, Helena, Hermia, Hippolyta, Lysander, magic, magic flower, Oberon, oberon plots, Puck, Titania, William Shakespeare
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“So quick bright things come to confusion.”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act One By Dennis Abrams ——————————- Act One: At the Athenian court, preparations are underway for the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. The royal couple is discussing arrangements when an angry Egeus storms in: his rebellious … Continue reading
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Tagged A Midsummer Night's Dream, act one, Bottom, Comedy, Demetrius, Helena, literature, Lysander, renaissance humanism, Shakespeare, William Shakespeare
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“It is his first undoubted masterpiece, without flaw, and one of his dozen of so plays of overwhelming originality and power.”
An Introduction to A Midsummer Night’s Dream By Dennis Abrams ———————— In his diary entry for September 26, 1662, Michaelmas Day, Samuel Pepys noted, I sent for some dinner and there dined, Mrs. Margaret Pen being by, to whom I … Continue reading
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Tagged A Midsummer Night's Dream, Bottom, Comedy, literature, Oberon, Puck, renaissance humanism, Samuel Pepys, Shakespeare, Titania, William Shakespeare
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“But when your countenance fill’d up his line,/Then lack’d I matter; that enfeebled mine.”
SONNET 86 Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, Bound for the prize of all too precious you, That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew? Was it … Continue reading
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“For never was a story of more woe/Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”
Romeo and Juliet Act Five By Dennis Abrams ————– Act Five: Friar Laurence’s message explaining his plan never reaches Romeo, and the first he hears is that Juliet is dead. Grief-stricken, he rushes to Verona to Juliet’s tomb. Paris is … Continue reading
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Tagged Act Five, Capulets, david garrick, death scene, friar laurence, literature, Montagues, Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare
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“Love give me strength! and strength shall help afford.”
Romeo and Juliet Act Four By Dennis Abrams ——————— Act Four: Friar Laurence outlines his solution to a desperate Juliet: she will agree to marry Paris, but on the evening of the weeding take a drug which will put her … Continue reading
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“Ancient damnation! O most wicked fiend!”
Romeo and Juliet Act Three, Part Two by Dennis Abrams ————————————– Much to discuss today: Mercutio, the Nurse, and the parallels between Romeo’s and Juliet’s crises, and the very different ways they handle them. —————————– First up Garber, whose view … Continue reading
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The Play's The Thing 