Ruth Leon recommends…Original Shakespeare – Globe Theatre
Ruth Leon recommendsOriginal Shakespeare – Globe Theatre
I find this short film from Shakespeare’s Globe, made for the Open University, utterly riveting. Two experts, David and Ben Crystal, father and son, walk us through what they call OP, Original Pronunciation, the way Shakespeare’s plays would have sounded in his own day sounded in his own day.
They show how, by updating his language to our own time, what we call RP, Received Pronunciation, so many of Shakespeare’s jokes are lost and how, by using his own dialect, so much of his meaning is illuminated.
Oh dear Mummerset! Billy Shakes was from the Midlands not the Zummerset!
Gadzooks, isn’t it hard enough?
Please please retire this vanity feature. It’s embarrassing.