Oberon Shakespeare Study Group

Margrethe Jolly, PhD; Kevin Gilvary, PhD; Alexander Waugh, Wally Hurst, JD; Ros Barber,PhD; and Earl Showerman, MD; gather  before the JPR radio talk-show on Sept. 23, 2015 in Ashland, Oregon. Photo credit: Julia Cleave. by Linda Theil Ros Barber, PhD ,  author of The Marlowe Papers , Shakespeare: the Evidence,  and the forthcoming novel, Devotion , was one of six British scholars who presented at the 2015 Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship conference in Ashland, Oregon Sept. 24-17, 2015.  We asked Barber to talk about her conference experience, and share impressions from her trip. Barber’s synopsized her paper, “The Value of Uncertainty”, for the conference proceedings.  Barber: Stratfordians are certain that William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon wrote the works attributed to him. Most non-Stratfordians are equally certain that he didn’t. This paper explores the benefits of uncertainty. Uncertainty not only allows us to be collegial, redu...

National Theatre Live! broadcast of Hamlet . Get out the Dyson cordless! Special-event simulcasts like the National Theatre Live! broadcast of Hamlet yesterday provide an absolutely new way of sharing Shakespeare. Remote-assignment Oberon member Tom Townsend sent the following Hamlet report from Seattle last evening. Tom Townsend said:   To my very good Oxfordian friends from the Seattle Oxfordian Group, and to the Oberon group in SE Michigan,  Today Joy [Townsend] and I saw Benedict Cumberbatch’s ‘Hamlet.’ This  11;00am  (Pacific Time) was actually a live performance of the play as was taped for re-broadcast. The short review is this: You won’t want to miss this version of ‘Hamlet.’ We were impressed with the actors (mostly) and especially with Cumberbatch’s performance. The stage was used in interesting ways to make all the scenes and action clear.   (On the other hand, some dialogue was deleted. You’ll remember this play contains...

Germaine Greer hits the ball out of the park in her Oct. 6, 2015  New Statesman review of  James Shapiro's newest Shakespearean biography,  1606: William Shakespeare and the Year of Lear  (Simon & Schuster, 2015) . Greer says: "For any writer of an extended narrative the temptation to abandon the conditional for the indicative is almost irresistible and Shapiro has not resisted it." Greer complains specifically about Shapiro's cavalier attitude toward uncertainties in dating Shakespeare's plays, about unwarranted elaboration of Shakespeare's relationship with London landlady Marie Mountjoy, about inventing the meaning of daughter Susanna's failure to take communion, and other issues. Greer said: With so little evidence, Shapiro is almost bound to overinterpret it. . . .  It is not easy for readers of 1606: William Shakespeare and the Year of Lear to determine when assumption becomes assertion, not least because Shapiro has chosen to provid...

by Linda Theil For Oberon weblog readers who are not familiar with the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship news webpage , I have gathered several of my recent posts to that page. Each entry below includes the post title, date the post was published, and a short introduction to the post content. To read each entire post, click on each headline. All hotlinks indicated by red letters in each post are live on the SOF news page. "LLL music a labor of love by Duffin, Caird, and Schmidt" Oct. 1, 2015 Ross Duffin’s work in documenting the deep importance of music in Shakespeare’s plays is a valuable resource to all Shakespeare lovers. Duffin’s article  “‘Concolinel’: Moth’s Lost Song Recovered?”  published in the Spring 2015 edition of  Shakespeare Quarterly*  was  reported this summer  by SOF Newsletter editor Alex McNeil . . . "Anti-Strat Brits to speak on JPR radio Sept. 23, 2015"  Sept. 17, 2015 British authorship scholars Ros Barber, PhD; Kevin Gil...

Benedict Cumberbatch as Hamlet in 2015 National Theatre production will be broadcast worldwide Oct. 15, 2015. Photo by Johan Persson courtesy National Theatre Live. Oberons welcome readers of this weblog to join us for the National Theatre Live film presentation of  Hamlet at 7 p.m., Thursday, October 15, 2015 at the AMC Livonia 20, 19500 Haggerty Road, Livonia MI.  Cinematic trailer for National Theatre Live Hamlet with Benedict Cumberbatch, October 15, 2015, and other dates. This Royal National Theater production featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as the eponymous Dane is playing to sold-out audiences at the  Barbican Theatre in London  for a 12-week run August through October. The Cumberbatch Hamlet -- reported last year by London's daily,  The Telegraph  as the most in-demand theatrical production of all time -- is now available to international film audiences. The National Theater Live performance of  Hamlet will be shown on Octob...