Katharine Cleland examines Jessica and Lorenzo’s clandestine marriage in Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” in this excerpt from her book “Irregular Unions.”
Troilus and Cressida is perhaps Shakespeare’s most obvious connection with classic Greek literature, given that the play’s events occur during the Trojan War. But references to Greek mythology are liberally sprinkled throughout the rest of Shakespeare’s plays as well. See if you can identify which mythological figure is being discussed in each of the following Shakespeare quotes.
Depictions of William Shakespeare in fictional works are animated by the same impulse behind fanfiction — to fill in the blanks of the story — and such imaginative speculation can help us understand Shakespeare’s life in a richer, possibly more responsible way than standard biography. Biofiction places a real person into a fictional narrative, and… Continue Reading »
In February 1682, it was reported in the London newspaper Loyal Protestant, and True Domestic Intelligence that ‘His Excellency the Morocco Ambassador is exceedingly well pleased with his Entertainments; Insomuch that he declared, that he thought there were not such Divertisements in the whole world, much less in England; so that he is very earnest… Continue Reading »
Thanks for celebrating Shakespeare’s birthday with us this year! We received many creative and inspiring responses to our invitation to #ShareYourShakespeare on social media. Many people recited a line, speech, or sonnet from Shakespeare’s works. Here are a few of our favorites.
Take a closer look at a 19th-century oil painting in the Folger collection that depicts all seven ages of man from Jaques’s speech in Shakespeare’s “As You Like It.”
