Pardon’s the word to all. Cymbeline is a play full of fantastical (or fantastically convoluted) plot twists, creative character names and sort of knowing winks to his earlier plays. There’s a cross-dressing woman! Mistaken identities! Evil Queens! And a title that is ever so slightly inaccurate – in fact, so much so that when staging … More Shakespeare Saturday: Cymbeline
Though I am not naturally honest, I am sometimes so by chance. The Winter’s Tale is another work hovering somewhere between “late pastoral romance”, comedy and a problem play, having a somewhat problematic structure – the first three acts are a dark, somber tragedy, a portrayal of the madness of King Leontes that results in … More Shakespeare Saturday: The winter’s tale
All strange and terrible events are welcome, but comforts we despise. Antony and Cleopatra is another Roman play, a hard-to-pin-down, almost true history of the later years of the doomed affair between the Roman general Mark Antony, and Cleopatra, the last pharaoh of Egypt. The historical events it is based on lead directly to the … More Shakespeare Saturday: Antony and Cleopatra
Timon of Athens is a tragicomic story of a wealthy, gregarious Athenian, who is a terrible judge of character. He loses all his earthly possessions through misplaced generosity, and consequently becomes a misanthropic, histrionic recluse. It is considered another problem play, with a particularly unsatisfying denouement and slightly unfinished feel to it – it has … More Shakespeare Saturday: Timon of Athens
The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together All’s well that ends well is another problem play, though it’s more comedic than Measure for Measure or Troilus and Cressida – a traditional comedy in appearances, but with a resolution that will leave something of an aftertaste. Like in many … More Shakespeare Saturday: All’s well that ends well
Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall Measure for Measure is another problem play – a dark comedy that leaves something of a bitter taste in one’s mouth. It’s a morality play, a study on human nature, and perhaps also a satire on the corrupting effect of power and the hypocrisies of the … More Shakespeare Saturday: Measure for Measure
All the argument is a cuckold and a whore Troilus and Cressida falls in many categories among Shakespeare’s plays – it’s a Roman history (yes, I know it’s set in the Greek world), it’s a tragedy, it’s a comedy. It is, in short, a problem play, it’s tragic elements sullied by both the uneasy events … More Shakespeare Saturday: Troilus and Cressida
Shakespeare for absolute beginners 