Shakespeare Project

I've always thought that it was sad that we don't teach the histories much. I read most of them in college and I don't really remember much about them. However, I do remember enjoying them. The big problem with teaching them in high school is that Shakespeare made a couple of assumptions about his audience. First, he assumed they would be British which my students aren't. Second, he assumed his audience had a reasonable grasp of (for him) the relatively recent political history of the English royal succession which my students don't. Without that background knowledge, the histories can be hard to follow.

Not too long ago, my father gave me his copy of Shakespeare's English Kings by Peter Saccio. This is a book that is a fairly common supplement to reading Shakespeare's Histories. Essentially, it covers the kings of Shakespeare's histories in a comprehensive but fairly basic way. While Saccio covers the actual history, he also discusses how the historical figures are different to Shakespeare's portrayals. It's interesting stuff, but it puts me in a bind. On the one hand, I need the historical information, but on the other I haven't read the plays recently enough to register what he's saying about the differences.

So here's my solution. Read a chapter in Saccio's book. Then, read the play.

Bwahahahaha. Brilliant!

Well, maybe not brilliant, but it does let me read each of the 10 histories with a sort of historical crib sheet. I've done the prep on Richard II so now it's time to read the play. We'll see how it goes.