Lecture about Shakespeare, delivered by Anthony Burgess to students at City College, New York [Commoners and Kings: A Midsummer Night's Dream and Richard II]

Scope and Content

Before the lecture begins proper, Burgess goes over gaps in knowledge that have been brought up in the assignments that he has been marking. This includes the nuances of Elizabethan grammar, the relationships signified by personal pronouns (e.g., “thou” and “you”), and blank verse. To stress the importance of blank verse to dramaturgy, Burgess uses examples of recent performances of Cyrano where the actors improvised over his lines [part 1: 4:30].

Burgess then discusses A Midsummer Night’s Dream in more depth than the previous lecture. In particular, Burgess highlights the mechanicals as revealing Elizabethan theatre practices, and the play’s democratic representation of the common man in fairy land. Burgess uses Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, more affectionately known as Robin, as a point to link Midsummer with his discussion of Richard II. Burgess frames this play among the hardships of 1595, which included rioting apprentices, bad harvests, inflation, anxieties about succession and fears of a second Spanish Armada. Burgess considers this play as Shakespeare’s first mature historical tragedy; as the first in the War of the Roses plays; as a representation of overthrowing and deposing a royal; and as providing the first verbose tragic part for Richard Burbage. Burgess quotes from these plays throughout, such as Part 1; 37:30 A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 2 (“Is all our company here?...”); Part 1: 43:50 A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1 (“Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated…”); and Part 2: 24:39 Richard II, Act 2, Scene 1 (“Methinks I am a prophet new inspired…”).

Audience questions are asked throughout but these are largely inaudible [Part 1: 19:10, Part 1: 22:20, Part 2: 16:48, and Part 2: 17:50]

Access Information

Open

This recording has been digitised and is accessible to researchers in mp3 format.