What did you think of the play, Mr. Littlejeans?

Mr. Greene, Vickers is a very meticulous and cautious scholar, but I think there is not universal acceptance of many of the computer-driven attribution methods he uses; although he did a great job I thought of refuting the idea that a new Shakespeare poem had been discovered a few years ago…it turned out to be by a…

I think the story that scholars tend to focus on is the Sir John Oldcastle one, which you probably read about on Wikipedia.  He was an actual historical figure from the Henry IV-Henry V years, who was eventually burned at the stake as a Lollard, a kind of prot-Protestant movement that was intensely persecuted by Henry…

Porpentine, I guess we can blame Gary Taylor for that!  He ran a seminar at the Shakespeare Association of America a few years ago (I think it was at the Boston meeting in '12) called "Thomas Middleton - Our Other Shakespeare"

nooyawk: I would say that your "gut feeling" is actually a fairly accurate assessment of what was really happening with the boy actors.  Most were apprentices in the households of shareholders (with Shakespeare's company, Henry Condell and John Heminges were especially connected to maintaining households with…

I like to think it is both…that part of his genius (I still have no problems using that word for him) was in taking advantage of the theatrical realities of his time.  Will Kemp's (and later Robert Armin's) particular comedic skills gave him a wide-ranging palette to work with, as did having a relatively stable…

The Goerge Wilkins parts of Pericles are easy to divine…when Shakespeare takes over in Act III the shift is palpable. Titus as collaborative is still hotly contested as are the "problem" plays and I would definitely argue that Measure and All's Well are Shakespeare alone. Timon is problematic for a lot of reasons and…

Yes!
Around 1599, he seemed to have had a really talented pair of boy actors…they may have apprenticed as Katherine de Valois and Alice in HV, expanded as Portia and Calpurnia in Julius Caesar, and then really came into their own as first Rosalind and Celia in As You Like It and then Ophelia and Gertrude in Hamlet.
Longt…

What Porpentine said…and I would strongly recommend a new book by Bart Van Os, _Shakespeare In Company_ which amasses compelling evidence for a theory that Shakespeare's absolutely unique position as a SHAREHOLDER in first the Lord Chamberlain's Men and then The King's Men presenting him with unprecedented…

There has been some really careful and interesting recent scholarship on the composition and practices of The Lord Chamberlain's Men that, among other things, posits that Shakespeare's company went through phases when it had talented and ready boy actors and other periods without. this may have had an effect on the…

Exactly! This is one reason why I have always loved these plays: Shakespeare really seems to perfect the centrality of conversation here: every time he talks to Falstaff, to his father, and even to Hotspur on the battlefield, you can hear and see these varied voices, these real points of view (Hotspur's bright honor,…

Falstaff DOES call Hall a bull's pizzle at one point

There are some weird dramatic choices for sure: I've always seen it from the perspective that Hal is partially reluctant to throw away his old self, despite what he claims in his "imitate the sun" soliloquy. He keeps giving Falstaff more time (until, as the new king, he cannot…when the final vestiges of his youth burn…

Thanks for another cogent review! I teach RII, HIV-1, and HV regularly but rarely bring HIV-2 into the mix. Even its publication history leaves it as the bastard stepchild of the second Henriad, as it appeared in a single quarto edition (RII and HIV-1 both go through numerous quarto editions ( although RII always had…

If anyone is interested, the Spring 2013 issue (Vol. 62.3 No. 288) of _The Shakespeare Newsletter_ (out of Iona College) has a massive and exhaustive (scholarly-tinged) review of THC.  It seems to be behind firewalls (I have a subscription), but my college library database(s) had full text access also.

i find almost every cut vexing but losing "the intestine shock and furious close of civil butchery" speech was unconscionable.
I have always loved that Aumerle, in RII, will in turn after his father become the Duke of York…the very Duke of York who dies so gloriously at Agincourt!

There is a long theatrical tradition of having the actor playing Lady Mortimer sing an actual Welsh song here (see the original BBC production from the late 70s for another example). Several members of The Lord Chamberlain's Men had Welsh connections and at least some them were accomplished singers/musicians as well.

"As just as meaningfully, Henry IV begins decades later…"
I'm not sure why this production doesn't at least pay lip service to the historical accuracy of the period Shakespeare was depicting based on his study of the available chronicle histories of Hall and Holinshed. _Richard II_ ends in 1399-1400 with Richard's…

This episode also gets very high verisimilitude marks for its use
of the (now defunct {I hope}) ultimate '80s men's fashion outlet, Silverman's.
In Detroit's eastern suburbs we bought all our skinniest ties and shiniest
trousers at the Lakeside Mall's franchise, which I believe the episode is
invoking.

I think there was an iron horse inn on Groesbeck as well, between 15 mile and Kelley. It is long gone