{"id":8002,"date":"2016-04-27T07:30:59","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T14:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/?p=8002"},"modified":"2016-03-30T09:04:11","modified_gmt":"2016-03-30T16:04:11","slug":"celebrating-shakespeare-broken-windows-by-bobbi-ford","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/celebrating-shakespeare-broken-windows-by-bobbi-ford\/","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating Shakespeare: Broken Windows By Bobbi Ford"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/BIGCALLOUT_Shakespeare.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-7999\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/BIGCALLOUT_Shakespeare.jpg\" alt=\"BIGCALLOUT_Shakespeare\" width=\"461\" height=\"215\" \/><\/a><em>In honor of William Shakespeare we are celebrating the 400th anniversary of his death on April 23, 2016. What better way to do this, than by highlighting the writing done by first-year students in Associate Professor of English John Wesley\u2019s first-year seminar,\u00a0A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare?\u00a0This first-year seminar in scholarly inquiry studies four remarkable plays Shakespeare wrote or saw into production in 1599, the same year he opened the Globe Theatre. In the first half of the course, students were introduced to the myriad ways in which Shakespeare\u2019s 1599 plays are shaped by and give shape to the political and cultural intrigues of that year. In the second half of the course, students turned to a play (and year) of their own choosing, the historicist analysis of which is the basis of an independent research project. As part of this project, students were asked to prepare a blog post that\u00a0reflected on aspects of Shakespeare&#8217;s life, a specific work, or a resource or organization associated with Shakespeare, or to provide a personal interpretation of a play. During the month of April, we\u2019ll feature the posts from students that celebrate all things Shakespeare!<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Congratulations to our wonderful first-year writers. For additional online resources about Shakespeare, check out these sites:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>British Library: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bl.uk\/\">http:\/\/www.bl.uk\/<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Folger Shakespeare Library: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.folger.edu\/\">http:\/\/www.folger.edu\/<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Globe Theatre: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shakespearesglobe.com\">http:\/\/www.shakespearesglobe.com<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Internet Shakespeare Editions: <a href=\"http:\/\/internetshakespeare.uvic.ca\">http:\/\/internetshakespeare.uvic.ca<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Shakespeare 400:\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.shakespeare400.org\/\">http:\/\/www.shakespeare400.org\/<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Broken Windows<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>By Bobbi Ford<\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_8033\" style=\"width: 202px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare2_portrait.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8033\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8033\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare2_portrait.jpg\" alt=\"Portrait of Shakespeare, 1884\" width=\"192\" height=\"251\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-8033\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Portrait of Shakespeare, 1884<\/p><\/div>\n<p>I don\u2019t know about you, but growing up I read one of Shakespeare\u2019s plays every year, and every year it was intimidating. When I was younger the language was hard to comprehend, now that I\u2019m older the concepts are what stumbles me. It seems that there has always been a certain ambiguity that comes along with Shakespeare. We try extensively to understand and theorize who William Shakespeare was personally \u2013 not just one of, if not the greatest playwright of all time. Analyzing his sonnets and plays to not only learn the bigger picture he was trying to create but rather what that vision can tell us about him politically, socially, or even romantically. If we take into account his works, the books he may have had access to, the political movements of that time, and who he got to work with, we can create a more realistic picture of how each piece of his life effected his plays. More specifically, if we look into the religious background of England we gain a bigger understanding of Shakespeare and his plays as a whole.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_8035\" style=\"width: 212px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare_CatholicChurch.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8035\" class=\" wp-image-8035\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare_CatholicChurch.jpg\" alt=\"A once Catholic church that was whitewashed during Shakespeare\u2019s time \" width=\"202\" height=\"281\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare_CatholicChurch.jpg 230w, https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/files\/2016\/03\/Shakespeare_CatholicChurch-215x300.jpg 215w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 202px) 100vw, 202px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-8035\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A once Catholic church that was whitewashed during Shakespeare\u2019s time<\/p><\/div>\n<p>It is hard to say for certain anything about Shakespeare\u2019s personal life, especially something as private as what religion he practiced. However, we do know that Protestantism became the official religion of England the year before Shakespeare was born in 1563 (Goaby). With that, we can infer that he was aware of its ceremonies and other attributes including its reformation of catholic churches through whitewashing. This was done essentially to remove \u201cdistractions\u201d, such as intricate stained-glass windows and paintings of saints covering the walls in the church to let the word of god be the focal point. One in particular, the \u201cright goodly chapel\u201d in Stratford-upon-Avon \u2013 where Shakespeare was from \u2013 had a glazier come to town to shatter the beautiful stained-glass windows and replacing them with clear glass. Since this was a public event chances are he was there as a child watching it unfold. (Shapiro) Seeing this could have effected how Shakespeare perceived religion and furthermore influenced his writings.<\/p>\n<p>In Shakespeare\u2019s time many things were changing and a change in religion added another confusing factor. Many official Catholic holidays that had been celebrated for years were no longer celebrated and new protestant holidays were added to the mix. This disrupted their everyday life because there was a certain way to dress for holidays, usually a special hat. When you don\u2019t know what is a holiday and what isn\u2019t there can be a lot of confusion. This problem bleeds into some of his plays including <em>Love\u2019s Labor\u2019s Lost <\/em>and <em>Julius Caesar<\/em> (Shapiro)<em>.<\/em> In the opening scene of <em>Julius Caesar,<\/em> a common man and a cobbler are dressed for the holiday, two men, Flavius and Murellius confront them for wearing holiday attire on a workday, however, it was actually a holiday (Julius Caesar 1.1). This confusion directly parallels with how the Elizabethans were always questioning \u201cIs This a Holiday?\u201d like in James Shapiro\u2019s book, <em>A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, 1599<\/em> explains.<\/p>\n<p>Another larger problem was time for the Elizabethans and was only worsened by the divide in religion. People were off of the calendar by about ten days. To fix this a pope suggested to skip day to get back on track. This seemed like reasonable and easy solution until the Protestant countries didn\u2019t agree, consequently Easter was celebrated five weeks apart (Shapiro). In <em>Julius <\/em>Caesar, the very noble and smart Brutus asked what the date is which if you didn\u2019t understand the problem with time back then you would be very confused why such an intellectual man would ask such a silly question (Shakespeare, Julius Caesar 1.2). Things like this and many others seemed to have directed influenced his plays. Though we can\u2019t know for sure much about Shakespeare we can use the historical events surrounding him to help better understand his plays and even further, why his historical plays are so important in understanding him.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Bibliography<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Goadby, Edwin. &#8220;Protestantism in Elizabethan England.&#8221; <em>Shakespeare&#8217;s Religion<\/em>. Shakespeare Online, 2011. Web. 28 Feb. 2016.<\/p>\n<p>William, Page. <em>Portrait of Shakespeare. <\/em>1884. Photograph. Folger, Shakespeare Library.\u00a0 folger.edu. Web. 28 Feb 2016<\/p>\n<p>Shakespeare, William. <em>Julius Caesar. <\/em>Broadview Press: Internet Shakespeare Editions. 2012.\u00a0 Print.<\/p>\n<p>Shapiro, James. \u201cIs This a Holiday?\u201d <em>A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, 1599. <\/em>Harper Collins Publishers. 2005. Print.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In honor of William Shakespeare we are celebrating the 400th anniversary of his death on April 23, 2016. What better way to do this, than by highlighting the writing done by first-year students in Associate Professor of English John Wesley\u2019s &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/celebrating-shakespeare-broken-windows-by-bobbi-ford\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[103],"tags":[104,105],"class_list":["post-8002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-celebrating-shakespeare","tag-celebrating-shakespeare","tag-shakespeare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8002"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8140,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002\/revisions\/8140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/collinsunbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}