Shakespeare
At present the Group is enjoying The Tempest: reading, discussing and watching on DVD Jonathan Miller's production of Shakespeare's rich and fascinating tragi-comedy.
The Group began in May 2015 and, other than during Covid outbreaks, has since met regularly in the morning of the first Thursday and second Friday of each month. On the occasions when we feel it may be unsafe to meet personally we read the material relevant to Shakespeare's work on our own, at home, then discuss it with another group member over the phone. Of course, working together as a group is far more rewarding - and we have the pleasure of being with the friends we have made through the Group.
Over the years we've studied A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Winter's Tale, Coriolanus, Much Ado about Nothing, King Lear, Henry IV Parts 1 & 2 and Henry V. We have seen productions of those plays at the Globe, The Barbican and the Rose Theatre, Kingston-upon-Thames - and watched DVDs of theatre, cinema and television productions of them. The Group has also seen and discussed the gender-bending Globe productions of Hamlet, As You Like It and he Merry Wives of Windsor, and the John Cleese-Brenda Blethyn The Taming of the Shrew on DVD.
Between plays, we’ve pored over twenty-three of Shakespeare's sonnets and the extended verse, A Lover's Complaint; we have discussed primary sources, scholars’ Shakespearian criticism and social history papers contributed by one of our Group. As you can see, we are an active group. The six of us like to take take our time thoroughly reading together, engaging in searching and wide-ranging discussion of Shakespeare’s plots and themes, his characters and their relationships, his language and imagery, the social and political history of the time, the inferences we can draw about Shakespeare the man and the relevance of his works for us. We exchange thoughts freely and have occasionally argued. Together, we’ve laughed and at times quietly reflected and shed a tear. Shakespeare's works raise a range of issues: family relationships, romantic love and infatuation; jealousy, separation, loss and reconciliation; sexuality and sexual desire; power and abuse of power; patriarchy and women's assertiveness; loyalty and human foibles; social unrest and war.
We find that Shakespeare did indeed
...hold as 'twere the mirror up to nature.
(Hamlet III ii 20)