12 days of Christmas ‘Heresies’ in Shakespeare
DAY FOUR: HAMLET: THE ANNUNCIATION OF THE SHEPHERDS In Luke, while the Shepherds guard their flocks, an angel appears – and scares the hell out of them. In Hamlet, while the Sentinels guard their folks, a spirit appears – and scares the hell out of them. Christmas allusion? Gets my vote. Let me know what […]
12 days of Christmas ‘Heresies’ in Shakespeare
DAY THREE: MORE MACBETH: THE EPIPHANY Shakespeare seems determined to undermine the mawkish sentimentality of the usual Nativity Play with his own far more muscular version of events. Christmas allusion? Gets my vote. Let me know what you think. SHAKESPEARE’S SECRET COMPASS: A FREE MASTERCLASS IN USING THE BARDPOWER IN 12TH NIGHT If music be the food of […]
12 days of Christmas ‘Heresies’ in Shakespeare
DAY TWO: MACBETH: THE VIRGIN BIRTH The ‘Virgin Birth’ is seminal to the orthodox story of Christ. But why would Shakespeare take such pains to satirise it so often? Maybe because, unlike the Bard, the orthodoxy misunderstands the mystical necessity of this miracle. Christmas allusion? Gets my vote. Let me know what you think. SHAKESPEARE’S […]
12 days of Christmas ‘Heresies’ in Shakespeare
DAY ONE: ROMEO & JULIET: THE VIRGIN BIRTH Act 1, Scene 1 is where many a cryptic foreshadowing can be seen. Here, two low-level Capulet gang-bangers joke about decapitating and raping innocent Montague virgins – seemingly in that order! Does it really belong in our list of 12 days of Christmas allusions? There’s some pretty […]
SHAKESPEARE’S SECRET COMPASS WEBINAR
SHAKESPEARE’S SECRET COMPASS: A FREE MASTERCLASS IN USING THE BARDPOWER IN 12TH NIGHT If music be the food of love, play on. JAN 6TH 6 PM – 8 PM GMT. ZOOM AND IN-PERSON Writers: do you ever really want to undermine the tyranny of tradition but fear the blowback? In 12th Night, Shakespeare shows us how he gets […]
Shakespeare’s Secret Compass
Why Shakespeare’s (invisible) formula is so crucial for serious writers to understand. Why do you think Shakespeare wrote? Why do you think his work lives on and on and on in a multi-billion dollar global industry 400 hundred years after his death? Could it be that his writing genius was largely due to the […]