Walking across London Bridge seems like a merry trip for many, or perhaps even a dismissable part of the daily commute if you live in London today, and while travel across the bridge was a normal occurrence for William Shakespeare, as well, what was decidedly different for him is that it often featured heads of executed traitors displayed on the Southgate of London Bridge. Along with severed heads on display, public hangings, disembowelment, and even burning at the stake were very much forms of public entertainment in Shakespeare’s lifetime, drawing crowds who often walked great distances to attend these events. We can see the culture of public executions echoed in Shakespeare’s plays, and those of his contemporaries, and how they choose to display--or avoid--the presentation of death on stage. Here today to take us into the culture of early modern England and help us understand the reasons, methods, and place of public execution and why Shakespeare may have chosen to handle death the way he did in his works, is our guest Murat Öğütcü.

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