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Shakespeare & Beyond

Shakespeare & Beyond

The Shakespeare & Beyond blog features a wide range of Shakespeare-related topics: the early modern period in which he lived, the ways his plays have been interpreted and staged over the past four centuries, the enduring power of his characters and language, and more.

What the Nurse Might Have Said
Shakespeare and Beyond

What the Nurse Might Have Said

Posted

Acclaimed Shakespearean actor Harriet Walter reimagines what the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet might have said after Juliet’s death in an excerpt from She Speaks!.

Watch | A look at early modern "selfies" by calligrapher, artist, and writer Esther Inglis
Shakespeare and Beyond

Watch | A look at early modern "selfies" by calligrapher, artist, and writer Esther Inglis

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Enjoy a video from the Esther Inglis special exhibition, showing how early modrern calligrapher, artist, and writer Inglis’s self-portraits helped tell her story.

Staging Puerto Rican Culture: Speaking Spanish and English in Romeo and Juliet
Shakespeare and Beyond

Staging Puerto Rican Culture: Speaking Spanish and English in Romeo and Juliet

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Author
Carla Della Gatta

Carla Della Gatta explores how bilingual staging methods help evoke Puerto Rican culture for the Capulet women in Folger Theatre’s Romeo and Juliet.

“Steeped in blood”: The doomed youth of Shakespeare and Stephen King
Shakespeare and Beyond

“Steeped in blood”: The doomed youth of Shakespeare and Stephen King

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Author
Austin Tichenor

With Halloween approaching, Austin Tichenor takes a look at Stephen King and a theme he shares with Shakespeare: the often tragic fate of younger characters.

Q&A: John Douglas Thompson on playing Othello at the Royal Shakespeare Company
Shakespeare and Beyond

Q&A: John Douglas Thompson on playing Othello at the Royal Shakespeare Company

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Author
Esther Ferington

John Douglas Thompson, who is playing the title role in Othello in the Royal Shakespeare Company production, shares his insights about the character and the play.

Director's cut: Exhibits inspired by "Romeo and Juliet"
ART Inv. 1095 Charlotte and Susan Cushman as Romeo and Juliet realia
Shakespeare and Beyond

Director's cut: Exhibits inspired by "Romeo and Juliet"

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Author
Esther Ferington

Selected by director Raymond O. Caldwell and the Folger staff, with evocative descriptions by Caldwell, rare objects resonate with the themes of Romeo and Juliet.

What's onstage at Shakespeare theaters in October
Shakespeare and Beyond

What's onstage at Shakespeare theaters in October

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Author
Shakespeare & Beyond

Read our round-up of October performances from Shakespeare theaters across the country.

AI and iambic pentameter: Making political speeches in the metaverse
Shakespeare and Beyond

AI and iambic pentameter: Making political speeches in the metaverse

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Author
Melanie Bender Martin

Melanie Bender Martin explores how the Folger Theatre’s Romeo and Juliet, set in a DC metaverse, was equipped with political ads… in iambic pentameter.

Alchemy, aqua vitae, and Mixology: How alchemy gave us liquor
Shakespeare and Beyond

Alchemy, aqua vitae, and Mixology: How alchemy gave us liquor

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Author
Ashley Buchanan

Without alchemy there would be no mixology. No cocktails, no spirits, no liqueurs, no essences! Dive into the history of alchemy and distillation, with two cocktail recipes.

High spirits: Alchemy in Elizabethan England
Shakespeare and Beyond

High spirits: Alchemy in Elizabethan England

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Author
Jennifer Rampling

Jennifer Rampling, a Princeton history professor and author of The Experimental Fire: Inventing English Alchemy, 1300–1700, explores alchemy in Shakespeare’s England.

A round-up of intriguing looks at "Romeo and Juliet"
Shakespeare and Beyond

A round-up of intriguing looks at "Romeo and Juliet"

Posted
Author
Esther Ferington

As we welcome Folger Theatre’s Romeo and Juliet, we take a look back at some intriguing and varied highlights of our past looks at the play.

Order It: Greeting autumn with Sonnet 73
Shakespeare and Beyond

Order It: Greeting autumn with Sonnet 73

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Author
Esther Ferington

Mark the recent equinox and the start of autumn in the northern hemisphere with a look at Sonnet 73. Take this quiz to see if you can correctly order the lines.

1 2 3 4 75