The curious and complicated history of the 16th-century play “The Lamentable Tragedie of Locrine” prompts interesting conversations about the Shakespeare canon and its apocrypha.
Posts Categorized: Research-and-discovery
Thomas Sheppey devoted several densely written pages of his 17th-century manuscript to the topic of sleep — how to trigger it, how to interrupt it, how to influence its depth and length, and even how to stop people talking in their sleep.
“I have had a most rare vision…” Bottom’s words in Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” echo the language of Spanish conquistadors describing Aztec Mexico.
Debra Ann Byrd writes about encountering an early female Othello in the Folger collection and developing her memoir and solo show, Becoming Othello.
The Inkhorn Controversy in the 15th and 16th centuries focused on the use of long, Latinate words as opposed to shorter, Saxon-rooted English counterparts.
One of Hannah Woolley’s books has sat hidden in plain sight at the Folger since 1990—included in the Folger online catalog, but missing from an international database that scholars often use to search for early English books. It is the only known copy in the world.
Recent news about proteomics (the study of proteins) in the humanities has included a Folger Shakespeare Library project, irreverently called Project Dustbunny, that studies proteins in rare books to learn about those who once handled or read them.
Interested in adding variety to your Thanksgiving dinner? Try this modernized 17th-century recipe for savory biscuits based on a manuscript in the Folger collection.
As October comes to an end, we celebrate food, drink, and culture in the German cities of Shakespeare’s day, including the creation of beer and wine and the harvest festivals each fall, marked by our modern-day tradition of Oktoberfest.
Lopez looks at which early modern plays were considered better than others (and why) and how the works selected to represent the era might change.
