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Shakespeare Day 2011 : Plans?
If you're new here, we like to refer to Shakespeare's birth/death day (April 23) as "Shakespeare Day" and celebrate it as something of a holiday. I point you, by way of example, to last year where I put out a dozen posts, gave away t-shirts, went to see open mic Shakespeare nights, and pretty much anything else I could get my hands on. That was a good one. :) That post is a link to the entire April 2010 archive, it's the best I can do, so you have to fish for it a bit. Here, have a link to my summary of the day's events. And here's how I spent Shakespeare Day 2009.
Unfortunately this year Shakespeare Day falls on a Saturday, which means I do not have any big online celebrations planned. There's just no way I can stay chained to my machine all day on a weekend when family obligations take center stage. I'm sure I won't let it go by unnoticed, but I do feel obliged to let my audience here know that there'll be no festivities of any significance.
There was some talk about taking the kids down to D.C. this year for April vacation, which would have meant getting to spend Shakespeare Day at the Folger itself. That would have been highly cool. But even though my boy does run around testing his pre-school teachers on their Hamlet knowledge, my wife and I decided that the kids are still a bit young to really get enough value out of a trip like that so we've put it off for another year.
What about you all? What are you doing for Shakespeare Day? I'm going to keep calling it that, and encourage you all to do so as well. It's not just Shakespeare's birthday. It is a holiday, a day for us to celebrate everything the man means to the world. Don't be shy.
7 comments:
ROFL I've been calling it Shakespeare Day since I first started celebrating it in...oh I suppose it would've been roughly 1992.Since that time I've always celebrated by having a strawberry dessert. I figure Shakespeare loved strawberries and it was fitting way to celebrate. The most elaborate Shakespeare Day was in Either 1999 or 2000-- whenever Easter fell on April 23rd. BBC America was running some Shakespeare shows, I made this phenomenal strawberry and white chocolate tart and I made a little flatbread castle that encased the ham. I also had my toddler niece singing Happy Birthday to Shakespeare.
This year will be a bit different because my bf and I have our anniversary on April 22 (because I can't forget that date) so we'll be out of town soaking in my favorite hot spring in Idaho. I'm hoping the little diner in Buhl, Idaho is still open and they serve pie-- hopefully I can still celebrate with a slice of strawberry pie.
Well, i'm still unsure about my Shakespeare Day plans. Here in Brazil there's almost no places we could go to celebrate it in a good style.
I'm thinking about going to a big park with some friends, making a victorian picnic and some Shakespearean reading, with tea and cookies.
Besides that, I plan to draw a special comic to my Bard Comics blog :)
Our local Shakespeare study group will host an UN-birthday party at a local mall and spread the word about why studying the Shakespeare authorship question can be so rewarding. See our past UN-birthday celebrations at: http://oberonshakespearestudygroup.blogspot.com/
AAAUH! Come to the Folger next year! April 22 (Sunday) will be the big party, and I would LOVE to meet you and your Shakespeare-quoting chilluns!
By April 23, THIS year, I'll be all Shakespeare Day-ed out. We have to throw the party on April 17 and it's on me to execute. Wish me luck!
I'll either attend the last night of Hamlet at the National (it'll be my fifth visit to this excellent production with Rory Kinnear!) or the first night of Hamlet at the Globe.
I think there are also some sonnet walks going on along the Thames during the day.
This year, the weekend of Shakespeare Day starts our spring break - we're out of school that Friday all through the next week, so I plan on celebrating that Thursday in school in style and then introducing my 18 mos old to the joys of William by reading through our Marcia Williams Shakespeare comic books. Yay!
In the Boston Area, Actors' Shakespeare Project and Orfeo Group are co-producing a day of celebration on April 30th. Starting with a parade and ending with a cabaret of presentations by different local troupes. The full details haven't been released yet. I just know that my commedia troupe, Teatro Delle Maschere is doing a scene from As You Like It.
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