Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare Unlimited

Despite our country feeling more divided than it has in 50 years, there are still things that tie us together. Loving our families, cheering on a favorite team, and—according James Shapiro—Shakespeare. Shapiro is an eminent Shakespeare scholar, who, like many Americans, has found himself confused and troubled lately by the divisions in our country. And as an eminent Shakespeare scholar, he looked to Shakespeare to respond to that confusion. In his new book, Shakespeare in a Divided America, Shapiro puts forward what he sees as a completely new and unique approach to American history. The book looks at times when our nation seemed at its most fragile and disconnected and tells those stories through their connections to Shakespeare. James Shapiro is the Larry Miller professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, and the Shakespeare scholar in residence at New York's Public Theater. He has written several award-winning books on Shakespeare including A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599, Contested Will; Who Wrote Shakespeare?, and The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606. His latest book, Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future, was published by Penguin Press in 2020. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published March 17, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “O Nation Miserable,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Jim Bittle, Senior Director of Broadcast and Multimedia Technology at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

There are lots of stories about Abraham Lincoln and his passion for Shakespeare. Some are true, while others are made up out of whole cloth. We talk to scholar Michael Anderegg about Lincoln’s love of Shakespeare and the anecdotes that recount it. Why do these stories fascinate us? What can they tell us about Lincoln, and about Shakespeare’s place in the American story? Michael Anderegg is Chester Fritz Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English at the University of North Dakota. He is the author of numerous books including Cinematic Shakespeare, and Orson Welles, Shakespeare, and Popular Culture. His book Lincoln and Shakespeare was published by the University Press of Kansas in 2015. Anderegg is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published March 3, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Welcome, My Tall Fellow,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from Andrew Feliciano at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California.

You probably know where Shakespeare got the ideas for his plays. The Histories come from Holinshed’s Chronicles. Caesar and other Roman plays depend on Plutarch’s Lives. The Comedy of Errors comes from Plautus’s Menaechmi. Troilus and Cressida borrows from the Illiad. The Winter’s Tale repackages Robert Greene’s Pandosto. But what if we told you that a number of his plays draw inspiration from folktales, versions of which exist not only in England, but all over the world? Charlotte Artese’s new book, Shakespeare and the Folktale, anthologizes some of the folktales that made their way into Shakespeare’s plays. For example, Lear includes elements of a story sometimes called “Love Like Salt,” part of a larger tradition of Cinderella stories. The Merchant of Venice plays out much like a Chilean folktale called “White Onion.” Wacky tales of twins predate not only Shakespeare, but also Plautus. We talk to Artese about some of these stories and about how she became interested in folklore’s influence on Shakespeare (it involves Led Zeppelin). She is Chair of the English Department at Agnes Scott College in Atlanta. Shakespeare and the Folktale was published by Princeton University Press in 2019. Artese is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published February 18, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “The Strangest Tale That Ever I Heard,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer.  We had technical helped from Andrew Feliciano at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Kevin Rinker at public radio station WABE in Atlanta, Georgia.

Do you have a book that means something special to you? 400 years ago, when printed books were a fairly new thing, they meant something to their owners too. But what they meant was, in many ways, much different from what they mean today. In this episode we talk to two authors about how people read, acquired, and collected books in Shakespeare’s time. Stuart Kells is the author of Shakespeare’s Library (Counterpoint, 2019). It speculates on what books the Bard might have owned and tells some intriguing stories about people over the years who’ve claimed either to have found the library or to have owned pieces of it. Jason Scott-Warren’s book is Shakespeare’s First Reader (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019), which dissects the library of Richard Stonley, an Elizabethan bureaucrat who was the first person we know of to buy a printed book written by Shakespeare—a copy of Venus and Adonis that Stonley picked up on June 12, 1593. Kells and Scott-Warren are interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. Stuart Kells is an Australian writer. He is the author of Penguin and the Lane Brothers, and The Library: A Catalogue of Wonders. Jason Scott-Warren is a College Lecturer and Director of Studies in English at Cambridge University in England. Recently, we had him on Shakespeare Unlimited when he discovered, based on research by Claire M.L. Bourne, that the First Folio at the Free Library of Philadelphia was once owned by John Milton. From the Folger's Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published February 4, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Give Me Some Ink and Paper,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from Andrew Feliciano and Evan Marquart at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, Roger Chatterton at Kite Recording Studio in Cambridge, England, and Simon Knight in the recording studio at La Trobe University’s College of Arts, Social Sciences and Commerce in Melbourne, Australia.

Did Shakespeare intend to publish his sonnets? For whom were they written? What do they reveal about their author? We talk to Dr. Jane Kingsley-Smith about her newest book, The Afterlife of Shakespeare's Sonnets, published by Cambridge University Press in 2019. The book is a social history of the sonnets’ reception, starting with a glowing 1598 review that it's likely practically no one ever read and travelling through over 400 years of readers adoring and abhorring Shakespeare’s 152 complicated poems. Dr. Jane Kingsley-Smith edited Love's Labor's Lost for the Norton Shakespeare Third Edition, and The Duchess of Malfi for Penguin in 2015. She is the author of Shakespeare's Drama in Exile (Palgrave, 2003), and Cupid in Early Modern Literature and Culture (Cambridge University Press, 2010). Kingsley-Smith is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published January 21, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, "To Thee I Send This Written Embassage,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Evan Marquardt at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Gareth Wood at The Sound Company in London.

We’re willing to bet that at some point in school, you read at least of one Shakespeare’s plays. Did you ever wonder why that is? How did Shakespeare go from popular entertainment to freshman-year staple? Professor Joseph Haughey of Northwest Missouri State University takes us back to a time when educators didn’t take Shakespeare seriously and English wasn’t even a subject in school. Haughey’s research focuses on the evolution of the English curriculum in American schools, and, in particular, the role of Shakespeare in that evolution. He is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published January 7, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “O This Learning, What A Thing It Is!,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Paul Luke at VoiceTrax West in Studio City, California, and Patty Holley at public radio station KXCV/KRNW in Maryville, Missouri.

In this episode, we spend 40 minutes with one of the world’s most influential directors. Peter Brook has directed John Gielgud, Glenda Jackson, Ben Kingsley, Adrian Lester, Laurence Olivier, Paul Scofield, and Patrick Stewart. His 1970 "A Midsummer Night’s Dream" is that among the play’s most lauded and best known productions. His 1968 book "The Empty Space," now an e-book from Nick Hern Books, is a classic of theater writing. Brook’s work is characterized by the search for new theatrical modes and artistic languages, and at 94, he continues searching. His newest work, "Why?", co-written and co-directed by longtime collaborator Marie-Hélène Estienne, opened in Paris in June, finished a run at Brooklyn’s Theatre for a New Audience in October, and will soon begin a tour of China, Italy, and Spain. A new book, "Playing by Ear: Reflections on Sound and Music," is also being published this year. Barbara Bogaev interviews the director about his remarkable career, his illustrious collaborators, and the big question: what makes good theater? From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published December 10, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “My Age is as a Lusty Winter,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. With technical helped from Andrew Feliciano at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Alan Leer at The Sound Company Studios in London.

Director Kenny Leon’s production of "Much Ado About Nothing" mesmerized audiences during last summer’s Shakespeare in the Park. Now, you can watch this exuberant, sassy, and political performance, starring "Orange is the New Black’s" Danielle Brooks, on PBS’s Great Performances. We talked to Kenny Leon about how he approaches a new production and how Shakespeare’s comedies speak to our present moment. Leon is the founding artistic director of True Colors Theatre Company and Artistic Director of Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre. In 2014, he won the Tony Award for Best Director for his revival of "A Raisin in the Sun." Leon’s recent film work includes Netflix’s "American Son" with Kerry Washington, which he also directed on Broadway. His memoir, "Take You Wherever You Go," was published by Grand Central in 2018. Kenny Leon is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the "Shakespeare Unlimited" podcast. Published November 26, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This episode, "Let's Have a Dance," was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from James Walsh at Threshold Recording Studios in midtown Manhattan.

Think there were no women onstage in Shakespeare’s time? Think again. We talk to scholar Clare McManus about where and how women performed in early modern Europe: emerging from mechanical seashells in elaborate court masques, dancing across tightropes, and on the stages of the European Continent. Clare McManus is a professor in the Department of English and Creative Writing at the University of Roehampton in London. She is the author of Women on the Renaissance Stage: Anna of Denmark and Female Masquing in the Stuart Court, 1590-1619 and is working on a manuscript titled Early Modern Women’s Performance and the Dramatic Canon. McManus is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published November 12, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This episode, “She Can Spin for Her Living,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from Andrew Feliciano and Evan Marquart at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Gareth Wood at The Sound Company studios in London.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time author Mark Haddon’s books take twists and turns that sometimes seem to only make sense in the context of his stories. Shakespeare’s  Pericles takes twists and turns that sometimes seem to make no sense at all. Haddon’s new novel, The Porpoise, reinterprets Pericles: the book is a crazy, imaginative ride that swings between continents, between reality and fantasy, and between the 21st and 17th centuries AD and the 5th century BC. It also works to right the “moral wrong” that begins Shakespeare’s play. Poet and novelist Mark Haddon’s other books include A Spot of Bother, The Red House, The Pier Falls and Other Stories. The Porpoise was published in the US by Doubleday in 2019. He was interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published October 29, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “The Porpoise How He Bounced and Tumbled,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. It was recorded by Rich Woodhouse at Electric Breeze Audio Productions in Oxford, England.

In the 19th century, a new influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe and Italy arrived in the United States. Many of them settled in the Lower Manhattan. Reformers wondered how these new arrivals could be assimilated into American culture. Their solution? Give ‘em Shakespeare. But at the same time, these recent immigrants were staging Shakespeare’s plays themselves, in their own languages and adapted for their own cultures, sharing performance spaces and loaning one another costumes and props in a vibrant Lower East Side theater scene. We talk to Dr. Elisabeth Kinsley about her new book, Here in this Island We Arrived: Shakespeare and Belonging in Immigrant New York. In it, Kinsley, an associate Dean at Northwestern University, explores American national identity and cultural belonging through Shakespeare. Kinsley is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published October 15, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “We Being Strangers Here,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Kayla Stoner and Kristin Samuelson of Northwestern University's Global Marketing and Communications Department.

In September, the world of literary scholarship got some big news. It was discovered that a copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio, housed in the Free Library of Philadelphia, once belonged to John Milton, author of Paradise Lost. The First Folio contains what experts now widely believe to be Milton’s notes on Shakespeare, in his own handwriting. Suddenly, we can read what one of the greatest English language poets was thinking as he engaged with Shakespeare’s plays. The connection was made by Cambridge University’s Jason Scott-Warren. Scott-Warren was reading an essay by Penn State’s Claire M.L. Bourne about this copy of the First Folio when the handwriting in the notes started to look familiar. Shortly afterward, Bourne got a direct message from Scott-Warren on Twitter: “Can I run something by you?” We talk to Bourne and Scott-Warren about what this discovery means, how technology (including Twitter) has changed their work, and what’s next. Dr. Claire M. L. Bourne is an assistant professor of English at Penn State University. Dr. Jason Scott-Warren is a College Lecturer and Director of Studies in English at Cambridge University in England. They were interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published October 1, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “We Shall Jointly Labor,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at VoiceTrax West in Studio City, California; Craig Johnson at WPSU public radio in State College, Pennsylvania; and K. J. Thorarinsson at KJ’s Sound Studio in Cambridge, England.

“If, with Shakespeare, we can thrill and tease an audience into embracing unknowing, that is one of the most important gifts that we can give,” says director Iqbal Khan. Khan has directed at Shakespeare’s Globe, in the West End, and at the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he staged Much Ado About Nothing, Antony and Cleopatra, Tartuffe, and Othello. We talked to Khan about race in Shakespeare’s plays, the math and physics degrees he almost got, and the importance of staging Shakespeare’s complexities and contradictions. Khan is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Folger's Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published September 17, 2019. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Tell the Tale Anew,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from Evan Marquart at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Dom Boucher at The Sound Company in London.

It’s not easy to turn a Shakespeare’s play into an opera, says Colleen Fay. They have too many words, too many characters, and too many plots. But sometimes, when it all comes together, a great opera can bring the essence of Shakespeare’s stories sharply into focus. We talk to Colleen Fay about the history of Shakespearean operas… and find out which ones work and which ones don’t. Fay is a former Library of Congress music librarian and was the founding head of the Performing Arts Library at The Kennedy Center. She’s a regular on DC's local public TV arts roundup Around Town and local public radio magazine show Metro Connection. Fay is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published September 3, 2019. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Come, Sing,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical helped from Evan Marquart at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California.

In Act 3, scene 4 of Othello, Othello tells Desdemona that the handkerchief he gave her was “dyed in mummy.” What does that mean? According to Lafayette College’s Ian Smith, it means the handkerchief was dyed black. In this episode, originally broadcast in June 2016, we talk to Smith and Ayanna Thompson about Elizabethan modes of blackface—which included covering a performer’s body with dyed cloth to simulate blackness—and how Smith’s insight changes how we understand Othello. Ian Smith is a professor of English at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. When we published this episode, Ayanna Thompson was a professor of English at George Washington University. She is now Director of the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Arizona State University. Smith and Thompson are interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From our Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Originally published June 14, 2016. Re-broadcast August 20, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Teach Him How To Tell My Story,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer. With technical help from Tobey Shreiner at WAMU-FM in Washington, DC, Neil Hever at radio station WDIY in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and Jeff Peters at the Marketplace Studios in Los Angeles.