Skip to main content

Remembering Shakespeare at Yale



I just spent a very enjoyable afternoon at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (shown above) at Yale University. This is an incredible building (the picture doesn't do it justice). I am amazed how all of these very rare books are displayed so openly (albeit in climate controlled areas behind unbreakable glass) instead of the fabled vaults of such institutions as the Folger or the Huntington.

This library is currently doing an exhibition called "Remembering Shakespeare" until June 4, 2012 and I would urge anyone who is able to do it to go see it. More information is available at http://library.yale.edu/beinecke

The exhibition explores how Shakespeare came to be remembered as the "world's most venerated author". It was curated by Professor David Kastan of the English department at Yale and by Kathryn James, the Beinecke Library curator.

There are an amazing number of items in the exhibition, including two First Folios, copies of the Second, Third, and Fourth Folios, quarto editions of most of the plays, and copies of the Sonnets, Venus and Adonis and Lucrece. There are also copies of many other plays of the time, listed as "collaborations", but which many Oxfordians see as the work of Edward de Vere.

Then there are multiple items regarding how Shakespeare has been seen throughout history, including a (somewhat snide) small section on "Denying Shakespeare" which includes Delia Bacon's book and a letter to her from Nathanial Hawthorne urging her to publish the book, as well as a copy of Twain's Is Shakespeare Dead.

Of particular interest to me was a sample of some of William Henry Ireland's celebrated forgeries, conceived in a desperate need to show that there was SOMETHING in the life of William of Stratford that could link him to the plays that bear his (or a similar) name. These were presented in combination with Edmund Malone's disappointed (but scholarly) proof of the false nature of all of it.

There was a nice section on Charles Dickens and his relationship to Shakespeare (but omitting the fact that he was a "doubter" of Shakespeare's identity).

There was a big section on David Garrick's Stratford Jubilee of 1769 and the impact that had (the beginning of Bardolatry).

There were copies of many of the source texts of Shakespeare. There were 19th century political cartoons based on the works. There was Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, based heavily on Shakespeare's use of the language.

I could go on and on, but let me just say that this is a one-of-a-kind exhibition and I am very glad I was able to see it.




Popular posts from this blog

Was King Richard III a Control Freak? Science News ... from universities, journals, and other research organizations   Mar. 4, 2013 — University of Leicester psychologists believe Richard III was not a psychopath -- but he may have had control freak tendencies. University of Leicester psychologists have made an analysis of Richard III's character -- aiming to get to the man behind the bones. Professor Mark Lansdale, Head of the University's School of Psychology, and forensic psychologist Dr Julian Boon have put together a psychological analysis of Richard III based on the consensus among historians relating to Richard's experiences and actions. They found that, while there was no evidence for Shakespeare's depiction of Richard III as a psychopath, he may have had "intolerance to uncertainty syndrome" -- which may have manifested in control freak tendencies. The academics presented their findings on Saturday, March 2 at the University

What's a popp'rin' pear?

James Wheaton reported yesterday in the Jackson Citizen Patriot that the Michigan Shakespeare Festival high school tour of Romeo and Juliet was criticized for inappropriate content -- " So me take issue with sexual innuendoes in Michigan Shakespeare Festival’s High School Tour performances of ‘Romeo & Juliet’" : Western [High School] parent Rosie Crowley said she was upset when she heard students laughing about sexual content in the play afterwards. Her son didn’t attend the performance Tuesday because of another commitment, she said.  “I think the theater company should have left out any references that were rated R,” Crowley said. “I would say that I’ve read Shakespeare, and what I was told from the students, I’ve never read anything that bad.”  She said she objected to scenes that involved pelvic thrusting and breast touching and to a line in which Mercutio makes suggestive comments to Romeo after looking up the skirt of a female. The problem with cutting out the naug

Winkler lights the match

by Linda Theil When asked by an interviewer why all the experts disagree with her on the legitimacy of the Shakespeare authorship question, journalist and author Elizabeth Winkler  calmly replied, "You've asked the wrong experts." * With that simple declaration Winkler exploded the topic of Shakespearean authorship forever. Anti-Stratfordians need no smoking gun, no convincing narrative, no reason who, how, when, or why because within the works lies the unassailable argument: Shakespeare's knowledge. Ask the lawyers. Ask the psychologists. Ask the librarians. Ask the historians. Ask the dramaturges. Ask the mathematicians. Ask the Greek scholars. Ask the physicists. Ask the astronomers. Ask the courtiers. Ask the bibliophiles. Ask the Italians. Ask the French. Ask the Russians. Ask the English. Ask everyone. Current academic agreement on a bevy of Shakespearean collaborators springs from an unspoken awareness of how much assistance the Stratfordian presumptive would h