Visiting a food court could actually be enjoyable if the entertainment were as good as this, organised by Improv Everywhere. The libretto’s a bit limited and there’s not much plot development, I admit, but just look at what one character does with her baby! I’m not sure I’d want to take part in the The No Pants! Subway Ride, however.
Raising a storm with ‘The Tempest’
Terrific production of ‘The Tempest’ from Baxter Theatre Centre and the Royal Shakespeare Company
If you haven’t already got your tickets to see The Tempest in the production from Baxter Theatre Centre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, I’d urge you to book now! We saw it at the RSC’s Courtyard Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon on Saturday and it’s terrific: Antony Sher, John Kani and a cast of South African actors, musicians and puppeteers. Starts with a bang and just gets better! As Lyn Gardner wrote in The Guardian: ‘Michael Billington has been raving about The Tempest, but don’t worry if you can’t get to Stratford because it’s heading out on tour.’ Read Michael Billington’s 5-star review here. It tours to Richmond, Leeds, Bath, Nottingham and Sheffield – find out more on the RSC site.
Brilliant – catch it if you can!
253 – Is this the future of the book?
Geoff Ryman’s interactive novel 253 is available online here. Of course, you can also buy a copy in a bookshop. So although this might seem to be the future of the book, it isn’t quite, not yet….
Hamlet & Co
Hamlet&Co, or Shakespeare sur la toile, is a useful introduction to Hamlet on a Belgian university site. And there’s plenty of it in English, fortunately!
Crusaders and First World War poetry
Appearing on Radio 4’s ‘Beyond Belief’ provokes thoughts about Great War poetry
I found myself (as though it were outside my volition) interviewed for today’s Beyond Belief on BBC Radio 4. As the filling in the middle of the sandwich, I didn’t hear the panel’s comments until the broadcast. I’m not entirely sure I agree with the comment that the First World War changed the public perception of chivalry and therefore of the Crusades, but the point about the sentimental invocation of a romanticised past is quite right, as can be heard in The Volunteer by Herbert Asquith (1881-1947), who was son of the British Prime Minister:
And now those waiting dreams are satisfied
From twilight to the halls of dawn he went;
His lance is broken; but he lies content
With that high hour, in which he lived and died.
And falling thus, he wants no recompense,
Who found his battle in the last resort
Nor needs he any hearse to bear him hence,
Who goes to join the men of Agincourt.
The same Great War site has a volume called The Holy War by the Irish poet and novelist Katharine Tynan which very explicitly portrays death in the War as religious sacrifice. For example, the Dedication concludes:
In this most glorious day and year
That gives your man to die for men.
Baddeley Cake: a happy tradition for Twelfth Night
A festive tradition set up by the first Moses in ‘The School for Scandal’
A happy new year! I have just come across the information in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography that the Drury Lane Theatre has for 200 years celebrated this day, 5 January, with cake and wine thanks to the generosity of Robert Baddeley, the first Moses in The School for Scandal. According to the entry, ‘Baddeley… created a small trust whereby every 5 January the Drury Lane company, still in their costumes, receive a glass of punch and slice of cake, known as the ‘Baddeley Cake’. This tradition was still being maintained at the close of the twentieth century.’ Has it survived into the twenty-first? I very much hope so – I’m sure the actors deserve it! The tradition was referred to by Dickens in his Dictionary of London of 1879.
You can see a painting of Baddeley in role as Moses at the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Liverpool – and online, with helpful notes. He certainly looks a genial soul!
Take away that bauble!
Children’s secretary Ed Balls on the dangers of the humble bauble – and other lessons from 2008
‘With a little more care and forward planning, most accidents and the resulting trips to A&E could be avoided,’ according to today’s Guardian. Sheila Merrill, Rospa’s home safety manager for England, was speaking at the launch of a Christmas safety leaflet from the Department for Children, Schools and Families. If only she had warned Ed Balls at the beginning of the year of the avoidable accident caused by the inflammatory combination of SATs, an American contractor already notorious in its own country, an Australian Chief Executive and a sleeping quango! Then the great SATs crash might have been avoided. The DCSF reminds us that ‘the pieces can be very sharp,’ as Ken Boston and David Gee will doubtless ruefully agree. Best put away all those nasty tests next year, then?
My hasting dayes flie on with full career
Looking back (a bit) on 2008
As I read the Christmas letters, I wonder what happened in the last twelve months that’s worth reporting. It’s hard to remember now – though we did get quite excited when Ben popped his head out of his window to give us a shout as we were passing. That’s him you can just see in the window high up on the right. Nice house he’s got, isn’t it?
There’s also been a trip to Texas, where I received another warm welcome. Before that it’s a bit of a blur, though you can read a few things elsewhere on this blog. As Milton hath well said in his Sonnet VII:
How soon hath Time the suttle theef of youth
Stoln on his wing… &c
Happy 400th birthday, John! He’s received some overdue recognition this month – and, appositely, he wrote a fine ode On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity. Just don’t ask what he might have said about the Pope.
Happy Christmas!
More Christmas listening – poetry and music
A happy and melodious Christmas to all our readers! As a follow up to last year’s entry on Christmas poetry (which you can read about in more detail on the Literary Connections Christmas page), I’ve just noticed that last December’s Woman’s Hour interview with Carol Ann Duffy about her Manchester Carols is still available on the BBC site. The Manchester Carols also feature in Aled Jones’s Radio 3 programme on Christmas Music for Choirs on 14 Dec 2008 at 19:00. Happy listening – and I hope you enjoy some singing of your own too!
A new memorial to William Blake?
Call for new memorial to mark burial site of poet William Blake
The Islington Gazette reports today on a campaign to erect a new memorial located on ‘the exact spot of the grave of one of Britain’s most famous poets – William Blake’. Enthusiasts claim to have located the exact place in Bunhill Fields Burial Ground where Blake was buried; you can see a picture of the spot with the newspaper article. As often, there is a motive: there’s money on offer for the park that receives the most votes from Londoners and visitors in the vote for your park campaign. What, I wonder, would he have made of all this fuss?
There’s more about Blake, including a picture of notes left for him by his gravestone, on the Literary Connections Blake page. Bunhill Fields also holds the remains of other famous Dissenters, such as John Bunyan and Daniel Defoe; more on the City of London page about the burial ground.