"I do now let loose my opinion,
hold it no longer…"
— The Tempest, Wm. Shakespeare
Today I watched my eldest in the first of two Shakespeare performances.
This was a scene from The Tempest; next week it’s Much Ado about Nothing.
The outreach program responsible for all this literary mayhem is the University of Texas’ Shakespeare at Winedale Program. In just a couple of months, coordinator and genius Clayton Stromberger has these kids (from 3rd-5th grade) eating out of old Will’s hand. He throws open the windows on Shakespeare’s humor, his confounding mix-ups, his fools…
Too much for elementary school?
Are you kidding?
This is the stuff of a ten-year-old’s dream!
This morning there was a good piece on NPR about the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s sonnets.
400 years.
The guy has some staying power, to be sure.
But when you hear him on the outdoor stage behind a sweet little school on a bright Wednesday morning, I promise you it feels brand new.
"Contempt, farewell! and maiden pride, adieu!" — Much Ado about Nothing, Wm. Shakespeare
Oh wow, that had to have been something to see. Hats off to that wonderful teacher!
Tanita Says 🙂
I’m hearing Will taught younger and younger — another fifth grader friend of mine in Canada got to be one of the witches in MacBeth, when they did a scene, and she was thrilled. I don’t think it’s too much — surely a whole play might be, with some of the adult themes and …er, bawdy humor, but I think I’d have loved to do The Tempest… Full fathom five thy father lies is so wonderfully alliterative and I could have practiced my Doomful voice much earlier in life.
Fun, fun. I hope to hear some Shakespeare in the sunshine this summer. Oddly Scots don’t seem to cotton to him; we have a lot of Burns in the sunshine…well, in the open air, anyway, and like as not in the RAIN. May have to wander over to England for a spell.
Re: Tanita Says 🙂
There were definately some doomful voices yesterday.
Fiercely doomful.
One of the scenes was with Trinculo and Stephano (who enters with a bottle in his hand). The kids decided it was Dr. Pepper and he was having an adverse reaction to sugar. So, even some of the bawdiness is scaleable. 🙂
Get thee to England, Tanita. Shakespeare’s meant to be seen in the sunshine…
Re: Tanita Says 🙂
The bawdiness is decidedly scaleable. And some of the phrases with double meanings aren’t completely obvious. (The ones about pricking and whatnot tend to be easier to sort out than some of the ones about, say, “dancing in Brabant”, where dance is a euphemism for sex and “Brabant” is a place in the Netherlands. Nether lands – get it? (Oh Will, how you did love your puns!)
Ooh! That is so, so cool! I recall you mentioning this last year, too. And wishing I could see such a thing.
Thanks for the NPR link!
So cool. I’m jealous you get to hear the kids!
So much fun! I so wish I’d been there to see that!
I think it’s a fantastic idea to get kids started on Shakespeare earlier than later. So many benefits related to language acquisition…plus, I’ll bet it helps remove some of the intimidation factor that develops when the Bard’s introduced much later. Gold stars for everyone involved!