Roaring Girl 101

Season 6 begins with a ROAR(ing Girl) courtesy of Thomases Dekker and Middleton. The famous city comedy features real-life legend Mary Frith, aka Moll Cutpurse, but not with nearly the stage time such a character deserves; we give you a brief introduction to the lesser-known Thomas of this collab team, Dekker, and also a Taste of Text where Moll’s voice really shines. Jess gives you a refresher on the city comedy genre, as well as the real life Moll and we deliver a little personal gossip. We hope you enjoy our roaring return. It’s good to be back!

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

• Aubrey’s rec: Dipsea

• Jess’s rec: Open Access Textbooks

Yorkshire Tragedy 101

It’s our ONE HUNDREDTH EPISODE EXTRAVAGANZAAAAAAA!!! To celebrate, we brought in new and returning friends of the pod, Charlie Bell, Courtney Parker, Molly Seremet, Patrick Harris, and Sawyer Kemp to read Thomas Middleton’s Yorkshire Tragedy in its entirety, purely for your listening pleasure. This week, you get your Summary, Taste of Text, and Tips and Tidbits all rolled into one ridiculous bout of reader’s theatre, with a healthy dose of murder on top. We wouldn’t want to celebrate the Big 100 any other way.

Here’s what we recommended in this week’s Happy Hour feature:

• the @adventcarolndar instagram account: 60-second 2020 carols, one a day till Dec. 25, by @joelwaggoner and @juliamet

• For a “Swiftie” kick: the Evermore album and Long Pond studio sessions

• @sotherans on Twitter

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

• ShaxBull’s new advisory board: Farah Karim-Cooper, David Sterling Brown, Lauren Eriks Cline, Vanessa Corredera, Sawyer Kemp, Nora Williams, and Sandra Young.

• Ruben Espinosa’s new book!

• Hailey Bachrach’s newsletter - Dramatis Personae

• Nothing for the Group newsletter/roundup by dramaturg Lauren Halvorsen

Women Beware Women 101

Women, beware those women! A solid title and admonition, no? We take you step by step through Thomas Middleton’s gruesome tragedy, Women Beware Women, with a summary, a Taste of Text, and more than you ever wanted to know about the significance of chess in the play. We also play a round of F*k, Marry, Kill (just in case you were looking for some dating wisdom) and reveal some quite exciting ShakesBubble Gossip news. How many ways can people die all at once on stage? You’ll have to listen to find out!

Click here to learn about the Shakespeare 2020 project that Jess will be part of later this year.

Revenger's Tragedy 101

In this episode we break down everything you need to know about T-Mids’s smash hit, The Revenger’s Tragedy. We offer you a Taste of Text (a new feature of our 101 episodes) from Act 3, scene 5, AKA the best scene in the play; we break down the authorship question surrounding this play, and then we learn that it’s a parody of other revenge tragedies (which is probably why it’s the best of them all). On top of all that, we introduce a new game and dish some smokin’ hot ShakesBubble Gossip fresh from academic Twitter. Why do we love The Revenger’s Tragedy so much? You’ll just have to listen to find out!

These are the links to the things we Gossiped about this episode:

• New source for Othello!

• Dictionary for Don Quixote

• The Theatre

A Chaste Maid in Cheapside 101

While the title alone should be enough to pique your interest, we devote this entire episode to the “finer” points of Middleton’s A Chaste Maid In Cheapside because we want you to love it as much as we do. We introduce a new 101 feature, “A Taste of Text,” in which we read the shortest scene in the play to give you a sense of its linguistic flavor; we re-introduce the contemporary, Thomas Middleton; we give you a fast and furious summary of this goofy city comedy as well as a LOT of dramaturgical background for all the allusions it contains; we play a round of Line Roulette; and Jess talks about a Haley Bachrach article on the play Six. Gird your loins and summon your Gossips because it’s an action-packed episode!

Here’s a link to Haley’s article: Six’s Sexist Agency