Romeo and Juliet
What My Students Really Think About Studying Shakespeare
At the start of our Romeo and Juliet unit, I had my students begin a Digital Shakespeare Portfolio: a blog account that would house all of their annotations, as well as a place to discuss their thoughts on the interactive…
Juliet's Answer
Shakespeare Unlimited: Episode 66 Starting in the 1930s, people began sending letters asking for advice on love and romance to Verona, Italy. The letters were all addressed to Juliet and for years, no one knew what to do with them. …
Shakespeare and YA Novels: Ryan North and Molly Booth
Shakespeare Unlimited: Episode 62 While print sales of adult fiction are down in the last decade, the juvenile market – which includes YA – has actually gone up 40 percent. In this episode, two YA authors talk about their writing,…
Shakespeare and Girlhood
Shakespeare Unlimited: Episode 60 How does Shakespeare portray girls and girlhood in his plays, and what do those portrayals tell us about life in Elizabethan and Jacobean England? Our guest for this Shakespeare Unlimited episode, Deanne Williams of York University…
Two film studios, alike in dignity...
The Folger owns a variety of printed items related to the cinematic history of Shakespeare—screenplays and manuscript drafts, pressbooks and souvenir programs, and still photographs. Generally, there’s a good chance that we also have the related film recording in some…
A carousel of tragedy
We are used to thinking of productions of Shakespeare’s plays as creating new works of art that demonstrate the vitality of the centuries-old drama. But in the right hands, books can achieve the same effect. Emily Martin’s The Tragedy of…
Charlotte Cushman: When Romeo Was a Woman
Shakespeare Unlimited: Episode 13 Actress Charlotte Cushman was a 19th-century theatrical icon, so famous and beloved that, like Madonna or Beyoncé today, newspapers called her by just her first name: she was “Our Charlotte.” But her fame was not for conventionally Victorian feminine…
Romeo and Juliet through the Ages
Shakespeare Unlimited: Episode 12 Though the tragic love story of Romeo and Juliet is a perennial favorite, the world around the play has changed in the four centuries since it was first performed. Shifting attitudes about taboo love and marriage,…
Seeing Double in the Romeo and Juliet Prologue
William Fox presents Theda Bara in William Shakespeare’s masterpiece Romeo and Juliet, 1916. Folger Shakespeare Library. By Julia Perlowski If the use of Shakespeare’s early modern English is under attack in some “regular” and “honors” English classrooms, just think about…
Your Backstage Pass!
Brian Dykstra (left, as Lord Capulet) and Joe Mallon (as Paris) in Romeo and Juliet. Dykstra Blog: Your Backstage Pass Hey. Dykstra here. Once again. I thought ya’ll might enjoy a tour through the mind of the actor (a semi-dangerous…
Understanding Understudying (or The Show Must Go On)
Brian Dykstra as Lord Capulet in Folger’s Romeo and Juliet. Dykstra Blog: Understanding Understudying or The Show Must Go On! Her Name? Stephanie LaVardera. Her Role? Understudying Juliet. Her Job? Saving The Day. Job Complete! Look, there’s lots of times…
Getting Technucal
Brian Dykstra Note: This blog post by Brian Dykstra was written during tech rehearsals in early October. Romeo and Juliet began performances on October 15 and is now running through December 1. “Ladies and Gentlemen: It is now one o’clock.…