In his fourth book, Daybreak: Thoughts on the Prejudices of Morality, Nietzsche seeks to unmask the fictions and delusions of European values and of European morality in particular. The book was written up from a series of notebooks that he worked on when out walking. It is divided into 575 [Read more…]
This year the International Theatre Company London brought a production of Macbeth to Japan. It was performed at Jogakuin University on Monday 21st May. Last year they performed Much Ado About Nothing. It was my daughter’s first trip to the theatre. She was eight at the time. She sat in [Read more…]
Here’s a good question to slip into a pub quiz or to try out on your friends who think they are Shakespeare buffs… Which Shakespearean character is given the most lines in any single play? Which character has the second most lines to say, the third most, the fourth most? [Read more…]
The town of Elsinore on the East coast of Denmark attracts thousands of visitors every year. Their destination is Kronberg Castle, or “Hamlet’s Castle” as it has come to be known. The castle was built by King Eric VII in the early fifteenth century. Its purpose was to command the [Read more…]
The Elizabethans inherited from the middle ages a view of man’s body as being composed of a mixture of the four elements, earth, water, air and fire, which were supplied by the intake of food. The liver converted food into four different kinds of liquids, or “humours”, which in turn [Read more…]
This post is based on a lecture I gave to Sekkai O Miru Kai, Hiroshima, 2009. Who Was Machiavelli? Niccolo Machiavelli was born in Renaissance Florence on 3rd May 1469. The Renaissance was a time of renewed classical learning, of discovered continents and rediscovered manuscripts, progress in the arts and [Read more…]
In 2006 another name was added to the list of fellows who were supposedly “the real Shakespeare” and another couple of authors were added to the ignominous bibliography of “anti-Stratfordian” crackpots. Every time another candidate is added to the company of pretended authors the already doubtful case that any one [Read more…]
According to the Daily Telegraph, a group of actors Changling Theatre have been rehearsing scenes from William Shakespeare’s comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor, in front of a herd of cows and the rehearsals have not only improved the actors’ grasp of the play but it has also increased milk [Read more…]
Almost every time I have a question about the plot of a Shakespeare play, I find that William Shakespeare had it covered. For example, when Othello confronts Desdemona with her supposed adultery she asks him to send for Cassio to “Let him confess a truth”. Othello tells her that Cassio‘s [Read more…]
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