by Annette Rubery | Jun 16, 2023 | Book review, Literature, Shakespeare
One of the biggest improvements to my life in 2022 and 2023 has been to re-engage with Shakespeare’s work. There’s been such joy – as well as healing – in reading The Winter’s Tale, Twelfth Night, Measure for Measure, Julius Caesar and Cymbeline. I’ve now embarked on...
by Annette Rubery | May 21, 2023 | History, Literature
New leaves on our cutting of Johnson's Fourth Willow, Spring 2023. Photograph: Annette Rubery. Dr Johnson figure, carved from the wood of the Third Willow. Houghton Library, Harvard. Photograph: Annette Rubery. When the Corporation of Stratford-upon-Avon wanted the...
by Annette Rubery | May 3, 2023 | Literature, Shakespeare
Cymbeline directed by Gregory Doran (2023). Gregory Doran’s production of Cymbeline at the Royal Shakespeare Company (2023) is a triumph. It’s the 50th production which Doran (now Artistic Director Emeritus) has staged for the company, and quite a challenge (the...
by Annette Rubery | Mar 12, 2023 | Literature, Shakespeare
There’s a distinct whiff of testosterone in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Rome is a city of machismo, where men battle it out, where the defeated fall on their swords and where leaders jump into the “angry flood” of the Tiber to race their subjects (now who does that...
by Annette Rubery | Feb 6, 2023 | Literature, Shakespeare
Measure for Measure is a play about watchers and those being watched. It’s also a ‘problem’ play (i.e., a play that deals with a problem rather than one that is problematic). It’s a play about justice, and in this regard, the question of who is faithful...
by Annette Rubery | Feb 3, 2023 | Literature
Wilhelm Marstrand, Don Quixote og Sancho Panza ved en skillevej, uden datering (efter 1847). Wikimedia Commons. Can there be anything more daunting than writing about Don Quixote? In the same way as Shakespeare, Cervantes is such a towering figure in world literature...
