Arden of Faversham 201

This week we bring in guest Sheila Coursey, Assistant Professor of English at Saint Louis University who works on late medieval and early modern theater and narratives of crime, to talk to us about how she uses Arden of Faversham to engage students in conversations about contemporary true crime narratives. We rabbit hole (just a little) into which early modern married couples ever get to be alone together on stage (hint: it’s NOT the Ardens), investigate what’s with all the white girls and their tears?, and try to delineate what constitutes a “true crime” or “domestic tragedy” story. It’s not as -ahem- clean cut as you might think (see what we did there?)

Here’s what we recommended in our Happy Hour segment:

• Some Instagram accounts to follow: @notquitebeyonce and @antiracisteducationnow

• Vim’s Shakespeare lectures

• Maintenance Phase podcast

Here’s what we featured in our ShakesBubble Gossip segments:

• That Amanda Knox documentary we talked about a lot

Clyomon & Clamydes 101

For our Season 3 grand finale, we would love to introduce you to Clyomon and Clamydes, the bro-nemies that predate all others of this period and whose play is nothing by rhyming fourteeners. We re-meet the contemporary, that prolific Anonymous, “waltz” our way through a summary, and give you a Taste of Text you will never forget. Jess also delivers the other part of her paper about shipwrecks (the first half is in our Pericles episode), we give you a little ShakesBubble Gossip to get you through our extended hiatus, and give you an impromptu review of NTLive’s Frankenstein, too (spoiler alert: we don’t know how we feel about it but we really like that nice Johnny Lee Miller). Friends, this will be our last episode for a while, what with 2020 being slightly insane, so we hope to see you happy and healthy on the other side. Be well!

Mucedorus 101

Why was Mucedorus the most popular play of its time and nowadays no one knows about it? And why can no one agree about who wrote it? Our special guest, Finch, gives us some answers. We (Re)Meet the Contemporary, Anonymous; we give you a hilarious Taste of Text; Finch absolutely slays a round of Line Roulette; and we do a little ShakesBubble Gossiping. Find out all about The Other Bear Play and more in this episode.

Arden of Faversham 101

In this “tedious and brief” 101 episode, we break down everything you need to know about Arden of Faversham (and that most elusive of playwrights, Anonymous); the Rhetorical Device of the week is antanaclasis; we do an (anonymous) round of Meet the (Anonymous) Contemporary; we gush about the ASC production of Arden we just saw; we briefly rabbit-hole about Sublime and other ‘90s nostalgia; we play an epic round of F*ck, Marry, Kill; and finally, we deliver the results of one of the #DickBracket semi-final match ups. In case you’re wondering, everyone wants to f*ck Black Will and kill Shakebag. Obvs.