That Shakespeare Life

For many of the performances we know Shakespeare performed at Whitehall Palace, including staging "Twelfth Night" in 1602, he would have performed at Banqueting House. Unfortunately, the original Banqueting House burned down after Shakespeare died, and while rebuilt in 1622 by the famous Inigo Jones for James I , the structure there today is not the original site where Shakespeare's company would have performed. Nevertheless, the name Banqueting House reminds us that for Queen Elizabeth the banquet was a large affair, full of all the pomp and circumstance you might expect from the Queen of England. After all, these state occasions were often used to welcome and entertain visiting dignitaries as well as to mark special occasions, such as royal birthdays or the Christmas season. But what was Shakespeare's role at these banquets? We know he was there, but was he just a performer, there to put on a play, or was he allowed to be a guest at the lavish dinners as well? And what were the standard aspects of a royal banquet in the 16th century that would have been seen and heard in the Palace of Whitehall or Hampton Court Palace those years that Shakespeare was performing there? Here to take us back to Shakespeare's lifetime and help us experience the formal banquet through the eyes of Shakespeare is our guest, Julia Lupton.

Theater began in England as a way for the church to share messages about the Bible with the public. Written in Latin, the Bible was not accessible to parishioners outside of mass and Catholic England relayed the tales of heroism and miracles found in the Bible through dramatic productions. This tradition came with some particular approaches to storytelling, theater, and stagecraft. As with much of what the Church did in the Middle Ages, they had rules about what was acceptable to perform which was the gold standard for public performances for centuries. After the dissolution of the monasteries and the establishment of the Church of England, the nation as a whole redefined much of its' culture, including its' approach to theater. For William Shakespeare, he was born as the nation was still trying to figure out where it was going to stand in terms of defining good theater and rules about performance, and in many ways, the stage was set during his infancy for the bard to take the world by storm through theater. We can see influences of the biblical mystery plays in Shakespeare's works, and the bard was known to heavily consult poets from the medieval period like Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower in writing plays like The Two Noble Kinsmen, and Pericles. But do these influences mean Shakespeare's plays are products of the humanist movement in which he was living, or does his work build on the medieval foundations that preceded him? Our guest this week, Dr. Helen Cooper, argues that Shakespeare's London really ought to be called "Medieval London in the age of Shakespeare" and we are delighted to have her here to share with us how she came to this conclusion.

Theater began in England as a way for the church to share messages about the Bible with the public. Written in Latin, the Bible was not accessible to parishioners outside of mass and Catholic England relayed the tales of heroism and miracles found in the Bible through dramatic productions. This tradition came with some particular approaches to storytelling, theater, and stagecraft. As with much of what the Church did in the Middle Ages, they had rules about what was acceptable to perform which was the gold standard for public performances for centuries. After the dissolution of the monasteries and the establishment of the Church of England, the nation as a whole redefined much of its’ culture, including its’ approach to theater. For William Shakespeare, he was born as the nation was still trying to figure out where it was going to stand in terms of defining good theater and rules about performance, and in many ways, the stage was set during his infancy for the bard to take the world by storm through theater. We can see influences of the biblical mystery plays in Shakespeare’s works, and the bard was known to heavily consult poets from the medieval period like Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower in writing plays like The Two Noble Kinsmen, and Pericles. But do these influences mean Shakespeare’s plays are products of the humanist movement in which he was living, or does his work build on the medieval foundations that preceded him? Our guest this week, Dr. Helen Cooper, argues that Shakespeare’s London really ought to be called “Medieval London in the age of Shakespeare” and we are delighted to have her here to share with us how she came to this conclusion. 

When you study the life of William Shakespeare, one of the first facts you will learn pretty quickly is that his wife, Anne Hathaway was pregnant when she and William were married. We know she was pregnant based on the birth records of Susanna Shakespeare, who was born just about 5 months after the November 2, 1582 marriage of Anne and William Shakespeare. But as anyone who has had children will tell you, until you are far enough along to start feeling the baby, you use a pregnancy test to confirm if a woman is pregnant, which brings up two important questions about the life of Shakespeare: Did Anne Hathaway know she was pregnant when she got married? Did William know it, too? And if they did know, what did they use to find out? Here to answer all of these questions and to help us explore the history of prenatal medicine, and 16th century pregnancy tests, is our guest, Alicia Andrzejewski.

When you study the life of William Shakespeare, one of the first facts you will learn pretty quickly is that his wife, Anne Hathaway was pregnant when she and William were married. We know she was pregnant based on the birth records of Susanna Shakespeare, who was born just about 5 months after the November 2, 1582 marriage of Anne and William Shakespeare. But as anyone who has had children will tell you, until you are far enough along to start feeling the baby, you use a pregnancy test to confirm if a woman is pregnant, which brings up two important questions about the life of Shakespeare: Did Anne Hathaway know she was pregnant when she got married? Did William know it, too? And if they did know, what did they use to find out? Here to answer all of these questions and to help us explore the history of prenatal medicine, and 16th century pregnancy tests, is our guest, Alicia Andrzejewski.

In the 16th century, King Edward VI before he died quite young, was focused on bringing education to the small towns and villages of England and that included officially chartering a school in Stratford Upon Avon called, fittingly, King Edward VI Grammar School. This school is where all the boys, including William Shakespeare, went to school for their primary education. There are a lot of myths and theories about the education of young William Shakespeare, and our guest this week, Taresh Solanski, is here to walk us through the history of the school itself, sharing what was studied there, how long students went to school each day, and what it was like growing up in Stratford Upon Avon as a young boy.

William Shakespeare lived in a time when politics and religion ruled the strategy of Kings and Queens throughout Europe, but perhaps the most notable method of securing peace for the self-styled King of Peace was through marriage. Bringing his own form of stability back to England through his marriage and children on the heels of the infamously virgin Queen and heirless monarch, Elizabeth I, James had marriage as a focal point of both his life and his political strategy. One of the defining moments of his reign was his and Queen Anne's focus on procuring marriage to his son Charles, and seeking out specifically a Spanish Match for that son. Today, our guest Mira Kafantaris is here to share with us the history of James "Spanish Match",what the cultural reception to all of the marriage for peace was in the common realm of England during and just after Shakespeare's lifetime, and whether we can see echoes of this cultural reality show up in the plays of the bard.