{"id":1388,"date":"2009-09-04T04:04:57","date_gmt":"2009-09-04T08:04:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/?p=1388"},"modified":"2009-09-15T05:08:29","modified_gmt":"2009-09-15T09:08:29","slug":"1388","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/2009\/09\/1388\/","title":{"rendered":"By any other identity…?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple weekends ago, a fellow classmate informed me that William Shakespeare<\/a> is the best author of all time. Though I disagreed wholeheartedly with him, it seems that I am in the minority on this point in London. Shakespeare hasn\u2019t been alive for many years now but (as many people have noted before me) his presence is still incredibly pervasive in English life. The revised version of the Globe Theater<\/a> is filled nightly with people clamoring to get a taste of the authentic Shakespeare experience. Right across the river, the National Theater<\/a> makes sure to have a Shakespeare play in its rotation regularly- something that is always well attended. After watching an entertaining but incredibly over-the-top version of Troilus and Cressida<\/em>, I was prepared to write a blog about how Shakespeare in England has turned into just another tourist attraction. I paid more attention to the audience at the National Theater\u2019s presentation of All\u2019s Well That Ends Well<\/em> though and realized that I saw more people than those who toted fanny packs around the city all day (items that I\u2019m happy to report I have seen only a small number of). The over one thousand seats that the theater has were filled with more than a few tourists but also many who actually knew what the correct response to \u2018cheers\u2019 is (something that I\u2019m still trying to figure out). So what? Two major theaters are showing Shakespeare plays- is that so exciting? Maybe not. But walking along the streets, you are guaranteed to see big posters advertising for Jude Law <\/a> in Hamlet<\/em>, Judy Dench<\/a> in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream<\/em>, and other celebrities in lead roles in Shakespeare\u2019s plays. Clearly, the man is still alive and well in London. Again, this might not seem that interesting considering he is known as such an infamous figure not only in the arts but in history in general. But the man has been gone for over 300 years now! Many other playwrights have produced excellent works (some that are arguably even better than anything Shakespeare has ever written) yet none of them have their shows playing in multiple theaters across the city or in annual festivals. I can\u2019t accept that his popularity still hinges on the fact that he\u2019s Shakespeare. Even the brightest star eventually fades away. I wonder the attraction and\/or loyalty to the bard isn\u2019t more a devotion to something else- a devotion to a desired \u2018English\u2019 identity that is found in the infamous Shakespeare. This may be a stretch but it could be an interesting point to consider.<\/p>\n

While I was surprised to see so many London locals interested in seeing a Shakespeare play, the audience was not an incredibly diverse one at either show. The locals that were at the show were seemingly (by this untrained eye\u2019s standards) predominantly middle-upper class, white, elderly people. There are exceptions to every rule, but this was the crowd that I most observed while there. This isn\u2019t to say that the theaters were too pricey for the majority of Londoners. You can buy a ticket to stand in the Globe for five pounds and a ticket to sit in the National Theater for ten. While some might not have money to throw away to the theater, five pounds for entertainment is truly reasonable. Still, despite the reasonable prices, the crowd that was attracted to the show seemed to be of a certain stature. I think it\u2019s also worth noting that neither of these shows is considered one of Shakespeare\u2019s big hitters and yet each theater was filled as one might expect for a Hamlet<\/em> or Macbeth<\/em> production. Clearly it\u2019s not the show that is so attractive but rather the playwright. And why? I would argue that Shakespeare represents an identity of old London. He represents a more homogeneous London. London today is anything but homogenous. It\u2019s incredibly diverse and is only becoming more so with each day that passes. With the word of the trip being \u2018juxtaposition\u2019, this diversity and change is clear to even the eye of an outsider. Is holding onto Shakespeare as an image for the \u2018good ol\u2019 England a means of coping with these changes? England has had many famous icons throughout its history but few (that I\u2019m aware of) have been so closely connected to their national pride\/make-up. So while the Beatles might have brought fame to the country, Shakespeare painted a picture of what English society was like. It was a society that may have been full of class division but one that knew the Classics, was incredibly mannerly, and conversed in witty and intelligent ways. Is Shakespeare\u2019s continued prevalence a means of keeping that identity in place? I\u2019m not entirely certain. An argument could be made on either side. Maybe people truly never tire of his shows. I would suggest that after three hundred years, picking up some Tennessee Williams or Eugene O\u2019Neill might be a good idea.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple weekends ago, a fellow classmate informed me that William Shakespeare is the best author of all time. Though I disagreed wholeheartedly with him, it seems that I am in the minority on this point in London. Shakespeare hasn\u2019t been alive for many years now but (as many people have noted before me) his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[75,78],"tags":[1138,1022,961,966,999,1137,962],"class_list":["post-1388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audrey","category-theatre","tag-as-you-like-it","tag-english-identity","tag-shakespeare","tag-the-globe","tag-the-national-theater","tag-theater","tag-troilus-and-cressida"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/norwichhumanities\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}