The History Of European Theatre

Episode 174: Ben Jonson's erliest play. Here we have the bricklayer’s son trying to make his way in the theatre and with the court.  Until James came to the throne, he was pretty unsuccessful in the latter and as far as we can tell more of less from the off his life writing for the public theatre was controversial.  I recounted the events surrounding Johnson and Nashe’s play ‘T...

Episode 173: For this guest episode it is a very welcome return for Eleanor Conlon, who you will remember discussed Titus Andronicus with me in Episode 22 of this season.  Having picked over the brutal actions of that play with Eleanor I was pleased to hear that she was interested in a return visit and to discuss the very different piece that is Love’s Labour’s Lost.  As you wi...

Episode 172: The dating of the play The early publication history of the play The sources for the play A synopsis of the play A play that explores language and it’s limits The opening scene Constable Dull The central ‘reveal’ scene and it’s poetry The character and behaviour of Costard The longest word in the Shakespeare cannon The pageant of the nine worthies The character of Jacquenetta Shakespe...

Episode 171:  For today’s guest episode it is a warm welcome to Stephen Watkins who is going to take us a little way forward in the timeline to the world of Restoration England where after fourteen years of closures theatres were again legally opened and where, as we shall hear, performance of Shakespeare plays formed a significant part of the repertoire, and this discussion does focus very m...

Episode 170:  The dating of the play The tradition of the queen Elizabeth commission The tradition of the connection to the Garter Ceremony The Question of who played Falstaff A summary of the plot The early publication history of the play in short quarto editions The sources for the play The very specific location of the play The character of Falstaff The way the dominating prose of the play...

Episode 169 A welcome return for Kyle Thomas to the podcast where we discussed Kyle’s work on preparing three of the York Cycle plays for performance this summer in Toronto.  As you will hear Kyle is part of a team that are going to perform the fifty-play cycle on the 7th June 2025 in the grounds of the University of Toronto. Link to the York Cycle Plays performed at Toronto Univers...

Episode 168: Although Shakespeare's completion of the events of Henry IV’s reign is very much a continuation of the story from part one it is a play with a very different vibe.  The vigour of the battle scenes and the exuberance of prince Hal and Falstaff’s relationship are replaced in part two with a more sombre and elegiac tone.  The effects of old age and the passing to time...

Episode 167 A conversation with Kyle Thomas where we discussed the long transition period between Roman theatre and medieval theatre.  As you may remember from my episodes on the medieval theatre this is a very opaque period where details are few and far between.  In my episodes in season three of the podcast I mostly followed the view that medieval theatre grew out of parts of...

Episode 166: As with 'Richard II' 'Henry IV part 1' handles some complex English history as it examines the relationships between the King, his son and the powerful Percy family.  After the deposition of Richard II Henry ruled for fourteen years until his death. Having ended 'Richard II' with Henry’s accession to the throne and Richard’s death in prison Shakespeare opens this play j...

Episode 165 In today’s guest episode it is a very welcome return to the podcast for Darren Freebury-Jones.  Darren appeared previously to discuss his book ‘Shakespeare’s Borrowed Feathers’ and I asked him back on this occasion because his earlier book ‘Shakespeare’s Tutor: The Influence of Thomas Kyd’ is now published in a paperback edition by Manchester University Press, making it a muc...

Episode 164 Fate, as in Romeo and Juliet, plays a large part in ‘The Merchant of Venice’, as do deep seated grudges, but these are more societal than familial.  We are still in Italy, but no longer in close knit Verona, but mercantile and outward looking Venice.  As Shakespeare wrote this play London was becoming orientated around increasing global trade and English trading shi...

Episode 163 My background reading while preparing the episode on Romeo and Juliet took me to many stories about and thoughts on the afterlife of the play and its continuing influence on western culture, what follows is just a few stories and thoughts that illustrate that continuing influence. Verona and Juliet’s Statue Juliet’s tomb Cibber’s Juliet Franco Zeffirelli’s film for the ‘love generation...

Episode 162 In today’s episode I look at Shakespeare’s early tragedy and one of his enduringly popular plays ‘Romeo and Juliet’. The dating of the play The early printings of the play in quarto editions The origins of the story and Shakespeare’s direct sources The opening chorus Violence and the hand of fate underlying the action The opening brawl and the threat of violence to women The calming vo...

Episode 161 In today’s guest episode I will be discussing Shakespeare’s characterisations of the lower classes and looking at the role they play with Stephen Unwin, who’s book ‘Poor Naked Wretches’ explores the variety of working people in Shakespeare's plays as well as a vast range of cultural sources from which they were drawn and argues that the robust realism of these characters makes them so...

Episode 160 A synopsis of the play The sources and dating of the play The problems with a historical drama in verse The historical accuracy of the play King John as neither a hero nor anti-hero Philip the bastard as a central character in the play The theme of self-identity and changing fortune in the play Blanche as a representation of innocence manipulated Queen Eleanor as the power behind the t...

Episode 159 For today’s guest episode we are going back to the Italian renaissance theatre and the world of the Commedia Dell’arte.  You will remember that I covered the Commedia and other early Italian theatre in season five of the podcast, but in this conversation with Serena Laiena we have much more detail about a particular theatrical couple and the world of 16thcentury Italian theat...

Episode 158 Picking up the journey through Shakespeare's plays with 'Richard II' A brief summary of the play The early performance history of the play The early print history of the play The variations in the quarto editions concerning the deposition scene The sources for the play The role of the play in the Essex rebellion The historical accuracy of the play The dramatic arcs travelled by Richard...

In the fifth part of this short series of guest episodes before we get back to continuing the journey through the Shakespeare and Jonson cannon I had the chance to speak with Dr Ian McCormick about the collection of essays he edited, which pulls together recent Shakespeare criticism in the framework of woke and anti-woke culture and the culture wars of recent years.  It is a wide ranging...

In the fourth part of this short series of guest episodes before we get back to continuing the journey through the Shakespeare and Jonson cannon today’s episode is a repeat of episode 32 of the podcast, first released in late 2020.  Having just produced an episode on satyr play on the main podcast and another on the papyologists who rediscovered the play Trackers for the fledgling Patreo...

In the third part of this series of guest episodes before we get back to continuing the journey through the Shakespeare and Jonson cannon, we are going deep into the world of the renaissance period boy actors, or perhaps, as they should more properly be called, apprentice players.  The habit of the period of young actors playing female roles is well known, but when I had the chance to ta...

Episode 154 As you know form last week’s episode I’m running a short series of guest episodes before we get back to continuing the journey through the Shakespeare and Jonson cannon.  Today’s episode is a repeat of episode 30 of the podcast, first released in late 2020.  At the time I was discussing the early theatre of Rome and with the Ancient Greek theatre already under my be...

Episode 153 Today’s guest episode serves as a great precursor to what is to come.  The discussion that you are about to hear with Charles Mosely focusses on Shakespeare as a man of the theatre and discusses how the plays were created for and affected by the Theatre, the Audience and the conventions of the time.  And that brief description does not do this wide ranging and detai...

Episode 152 Following on from my thoughts on A Midsummer Night’s Dream last time I’m very pleased to welcome back Rachel Aanstad to the podcast for further thoughts on the play.  You may remember from our previous conversation about Twelfth Night that Rachel has devoted a lifetime to both the study and presentation of Shakespeare plays and as with Twelfth Night she has written an Illustr...

Episode 151 Having finished with Ben Jonson’s biography we can now go back in time just a little to work through Shakespeare’s and Jonson’s plays in more detail.  By the early 1590s was then the man of the theatrical moment, no longer the young upstart, but the proven playmaker and ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ surely did nothing but enhance that reputation and it has been popular ever sin...

Episode 150: For this very appropriately timed guest episode, which is released on the 6th January, Rachel Aanstad kindly agreed to come on the podcast and talk about the Elizabethan twelfth night traditions and Shakespeare’s play of the same name.  As you will hear our discussion became very much more wide ranging than that, as is often the way when we talk about Shakespeare. ...