A series of lectures by leading international scholars, running from June to August and presented in association with Southwark Cathedral, will mark the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible. Speakers include David Crystal, Arnold Hunt, Bryan Crockett and Diarmaid McCulloch, whose lecture on Thomas Cranmer is dedicated to the late Colin Slee, Dean of Southwark, who initiated the series.
Professor Graham Holderness of the University of Hertfordshire is the 2011 Sam Wanamaker Fellow and will give a special lecture entitled Bible Babel, at 7.00pm on Tuesday 14 June. The lecture will consider the special relationship between Shakespeare and the King James Bible, and explore the reasons why the two works have been continually, though not always rationally, interconnected.
On Thursday 23 June, Howard Brenton will discuss his acclaimed play Anne Boleyn in the light of his fascination with Tyndale’s Bible. Anne Boleyn returns to the Globe this summer after its sell-out run last year. John Wolfson’s annual talk, on Thursday 18 August, will explore the more secular short story collections that provided Shakespeare with much of his source material.
Between May and September, Globe Education’s Read Not Dead series will present staged readings of rarely performed plays, also reflecting the season’s biblical theme and exploring the repercussions of the Protestant Reformation. Playwrights featured include George Peele, Gervase Markham, William Simpson and Christopher Marlowe.
Leading academics will provide introductions to the evening play in Setting the Scene presentations on selected Tuesday and Thursday evenings throughout the theatre season. Meanwhile, Talking Theatre, taking place on selected Wednesdays and Saturdays 20 minutes after the matinee performance, will give audiences the chance to meet members of the cast and creative team in free post-show discussions.
ChildsPlay workshops on selected Saturdays will provide eight to eleven year olds with an active introduction to Much Ado About Nothing. The children will take part in storytelling and art activities, before joining the groundlings to watch 15 minutes of the matinee performance which their parents and guardians are attending.
The 2011 theatre season, The Word is God, runs at Shakespeare’s Globe until 2 October.
