National Shakespeare Day

MY Kingdom FOR A BARD!

Art writer Kristy Campbell celebrates National Shakespeare Day and looks at his influence on language and art

Announcement of the third lockdown in the UK from the New Year has spurred many of us on to source new hobbies, arrange indoor family activities, and to celebrate national holidays and observances that we might not have taken the time to do before.

Already, 2021 has gifted us the Orthodox New Year, Burns Night, Chinese New Year, Shrove Tuesday, Valentine’s Day, Purim, and Maha Shivaratri. So why stop there? Each year on the 23 April, National Shakespeare Day is observed globally, to commemorate one of the world’s most distinguished poets and playwrights. Shakespeare’s contribution to the English Language has left a monumental mark to this day, gifting us an exceptional list of plays, sonnets and verses, composed of elaborate speeches, dramatic metaphors, rhyming couplets, and vivid representations of comedy and tragedy. Throughout the UK, students often have the pleasure (and the challenge) of studying his works in English and Drama studies, while many individuals join production companies to indulge in and master the complex style and expressions. Some of Shakespeare’s treasures include - Richard III, Henry VI, The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth. Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare’s birthplace, is also home to his burial site, where flowers are laid annually during the celebrations. It is here in this medieval market town that pageants and processions take place to commemorate his work. Music and dancing bring the town to life, with actors in themed attire retelling his tales. Along with the remarks ‘Love is blind’ (The Merchant of Venice), ‘Vanish in to thin air’ (Othello), and ‘Break the ice’ (The Taming of the Shrew), Shakespeare also left behind the very place where many of these terms were first projected, The Globe Theatre in London. Originally built in 1599 by the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, an acting company Shakespeare wrote for, the theatre was later destroyed by fire and replaced by a contemporary structure in 1997 in Southwark, London.

‘Shakespeare’s Globe’ is now home to not just a theatre, but a production company for artists, an educative site, and a gallery of Shakespearean archive.

While Shakespeare’s works remain a source of inspiration and technical brilliance in literature, we may also spy depictions of his scenes in the works of Sir John Everett Millais, who produced the stunning representation of Ophelia (1851), a study from Hamlet; John William Waterhouse’s portrait of Miranda – The Tempest (1916); and Edward Austin Abbey’s oil painting of King Lear, Act I Scene I (18971898), to note a mere few. If you haven’t yet had the chance to immerse yourself in the romantic and radical tonguetwisting writings of Shakespeare, why not consider taking part in some fun activities such as playing with some of the language used in his works, incorporating thee and thou, or perhaps taking a look at the clothing of the time and designing a facepiece for a masquerade ball? You might want to try your hand at writing a sonnet, which requires 14 lines of text, divided into three sets of four lines, and one of two lines.

Celebrating alternative observances can be educational and help foster new lines of interest. So, if you can, take the time to make this last cycle of the lockdown calendar an insightful and enjoyable last stretch into summer. Stay safe.

Kristy Campbell www.axisweb.org/p/kristycamp @kristycamp Kristycamp17@gmail.com