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Shakespeare & Beyond

Edward Dering and the earliest record of an amateur private performance of a Shakespeare play

The Dering manuscript
The Dering manuscript

Recently New York Times theater critic Ben Brantley extolled the virtues of reading plays out loud in your living room as a way to while away the COVID-19 time at home. Memories of his own time reading Hamlet as a child opposite his mother “have been much on my mind in this time of shuttered theaters and social isolation . . . reading plays aloud is a tradition I’d love to revive — and one I would highly recommend to those looking for ways to find magic in empty hours.”

Today we look at the earliest record of an amateur private performance of a Shakespeare play, jumping in the way-back machine and journeying to the English county of Kent in the 1620s.

Comments

Just going to begin an MA on Shakespeare and teaching at Brigham Young University. Wondering about any resources you might think worthwhile on teaching Shakespeare through performance. Thank you!

Karen Maxwell — May 26, 2020

[…] as is the case in A Bright Ray of Darkness. This practice dates back to at least 1623, when Sir Edward Dering prepared a combination script for what seems to have been an amateur, at-home performance with family and friends. Dering was a […]

Collection Connections: 'A Bright Ray of Darkness' - The Folger Spotlight — May 4, 2021