Lauren Gunderson on the Women of Hamlet
What if Gertrude had more power than we thought? What if Ophelia’s fate wasn’t sealed from the start? And what does it really mean to mother a prince who might be losing his mind? Playwright Lauren G...
24 Feb 202534min
Shakespeare’s Narrative Poems
How did early modern England understand race and how has that influenced our thinking? Race is often considered a recent construct, but Shakespeare’s works—both his plays and poetry—reveal a diverse ...
6 Feb 202533min
Nisha Sharma on Adapting Shakespeare for Modern Romances
How do Shakespeare’s timeless themes translate to the South Asian diaspora? Could the man from Stratford himself be reimagined as a meddling auntie? Novelist Nisha Sharma’s If Shakespeare Were an Aunt...
23 Jan 202531min
Olivia Hussey: The Girl on the Balcony (Rebroadcast)
Olivia Hussey, whose spirited portrayal of Juliet when she was just a teenager herself became iconic for generations of people watching the 1968 film adaptation of Shakespeare’s play, died on December...
8 Jan 202533min
Shakespeare and his contemporaries, with Darren Freebury-Jones
What does it mean to be called an “upstart crow”? In 1592, a pamphlet titled Greene’s groats-worth of witte described William Shakespeare, in the first allusion to him as a playwright, with this phras...
19 Des 202433min
Directing Romeo and Juliet, with Sam Gold
2024 has been the year of the iconic lovers Romeo and Juliet, and director Sam Gold has brought a bold new production of the timeless tragedy to Broadway. With a fresh, contemporary approach, Gold tr...
13 Des 202435min
The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV, with Helen Castor
What happens when a king believes he rules by divine right yet loses the trust of his people through his tyrannical actions? In this episode, acclaimed historian Helen Castor brings us into the world ...
26 Nov 202444min
Studying Shakespeare Now
Forget dusty textbooks and silent classrooms—the Folger Shakespeare Library has released new teaching guides designed to make the Bard’s works more engaging, accessible, and inclusive than ever before...
20 Nov 202436min
