I know almost nothing about Shakespeare’s history plays, except that we were randomly assigned to read Richard III in tenth grade, and I am entirely grateful to that teacher (for that, and that alone — I never really liked her) for introducing us to the lesser known Shakespeares, even as famous as Richard III is ultimately. If you’re trying to keep your history straight, the earliest of the histories (of England plays) King John appears first, ruling around 1200 during the absence of King Richard. […]

I am teaching Hamlet again this year, and so I reread it this weekend to remember it before I read it a few more time to build the unit for the students. Later I will let the students review it too. Rereading it it’s hard not to remember how funny, weird, and brilliant Hamlet is, how frustrating he is as a character, and how much he really needs to look at some of the many different foils the play offers up for ways to act. […]

What fools these mortals be! And also what dicks these immortals be, well Puck and Oberon at least. In this Shakespeare comedy, we find four young Athenian nobles trying to sort out their possible marriages. Their parents are making wrong choices or choices that only adhere to the parent’s political and financial desires, and not the love of the young people. Everything all mixed up, they decide to run away. The find their way into the woods where they are found sleeping by Oberon, king […]