Some day it’s going to happen: You’re going to find yourself on stage, wearing tights, and saying things in iambic pentameter. Face it, you’re in a Shakespeare play, and that means it’s a pretty good bet you’re going to DIE. The Bard is out for blood, but this play is here to stop him! How could Romeo and Juliet survive? Julius Caesar? A nameless soldier in Henry the Fifth? What if King Lear had an emotional support llama and didn’t need to make terrible mistakes? Join us in discovering how a dozen of Shakespeare’s plays could’ve turned out differently! If only they listened… (If you loved 10 Ways to Survive the Zombie Apocalypse, read this guide immediately.) New VIRTUAL VERSION of the play now available. Comedy One-act. 30-60 minutes (Length of the play: This show is approximately one hour long. To cut it into a shorter one-act, simply remove one or more of the sections.) 10-50+ actors, gender flexible

The question of what happens after death was a vital one in Shakespeare's time, as it is today. And, like today, the answers were by no means universally agreed upon. Early moderns held surprisingly diverse beliefs about the afterlife and about how earthly life affected one's fate after death. Was death akin to a sleep where one did not wake until judgment day? Were sick bodies healed in heaven? Did sinners experience torment after death? Would an individual reunite with loved ones in the afterlife? Could the dead communicate with the world of the living? Could the living affect the state of souls after death? How should the dead be commemorated? Could the dead return to life? Was immortality possible? The wide array of possible answers to these questions across Shakespeare's work can be surprising. Exploring how particular texts and characters answer these questions, Shakespeare and the Afterlife showcases the vitality and originality of the author's language and thinking. We encounter characters with very personal visions of what awaits them after death, and these visions reveal new insights into these individuals' motivations and concerns as they navigate the world of the living. Shakespeare and the Afterlife encourages us to engage with the author's work with new insight and new curiosity. The volume connects some of the best-known speeches, characters, and conflicts to cultural debates and traditions circulating during Shakespeare's time.

Nominated for the Carnegie Medal 2011 Shakespeare in Love meets Twelfth Night - A gripping and evocative historical novel by bestselling Celia Rees

“Much like Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, M. L. Rio’s sparkling debut is a richly layered story of love, friendship, and obsession...will keep you riveted through its final, electrifying moments.” —Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, New York Times bestselling author of The Nest "Nerdily (and winningly) in love with Shakespeare...Readable, smart.” —New York Times Book Review On the day Oliver Marks is released from jail, the man who put him there is waiting at the door. Detective Colborne wants to know the truth, and after ten years, Oliver is finally ready to tell it. A decade ago: Oliver is one of seven young Shakespearean actors at Dellecher Classical Conservatory, a place of keen ambition and fierce competition. In this secluded world of firelight and leather-bound books, Oliver and his friends play the same roles onstage and off: hero, villain, tyrant, temptress, ingénue, extras. But in their fourth and final year, good-natured rivalries turn ugly, and on opening night real violence invades the students’ world of make-believe. In the morning, the fourth-years find themselves facing their very own tragedy, and their greatest acting challenge yet: convincing the police, each other, and themselves that they are innocent. If We Were Villains was named one of Bustle's Best Thriller Novels of the Year, and Mystery Scene says, "A well-written and gripping ode to the stage...A fascinating, unorthodox take on rivalry, friendship, and truth."

William Shakespeare found dozens of different ways to kill off his characters, and audiences today still enjoy the same reactions – shock, sadness, fear – that they did more than 400 years ago when these plays were first performed. But how realistic are these deaths, and did Shakespeare have the knowledge to back them up? In the Bard's day death was a part of everyday life. Plague, pestilence and public executions were a common occurrence, and the chances of seeing a dead or dying body on the way home from the theatre were high. It was also a time of important scientific progress. Shakespeare kept pace with anatomical and medical advances, and he included the latest scientific discoveries in his work, from blood circulation to treatments for syphilis. He certainly didn't shy away from portraying the reality of death on stage, from the brutal to the mundane, and the spectacular to the silly. Elizabethan London provides the backdrop for Death by Shakespeare, as Kathryn Harkup turns her discerning scientific eye to the Bard and the varied and creative ways his characters die. Was death by snakebite as serene as Shakespeare makes out? Could lack of sleep have killed Lady Macbeth? Can you really murder someone by pouring poison in their ear? Kathryn investigates what actual events may have inspired Shakespeare, what the accepted scientific knowledge of the time was, and how Elizabethan audiences would have responded to these death scenes. Death by Shakespeare will tell you all this and more in a rollercoaster of Elizabethan carnage, poison, swordplay and bloodshed, with an occasional death by bear-mauling for good measure.

"The Tragedy of Titus Andronicus" by William Shakespeare is a gripping and intense drama that explores themes of revenge, betrayal, and the destructive consequences of violence. Set in ancient Rome, the play follows the tragic downfall of the noble general Titus Andronicus and his family as they become embroiled in a cycle of vengeance and bloodshed. At the heart of the story is the brutal conflict between Titus Andronicus and Tamora, Queen of the Goths, whose sons are executed by Titus as retribution for their crimes. In retaliation, Tamora and her lover, Aaron the Moor, orchestrate a series of heinous acts of revenge against Titus and his family, plunging them into a spiral of madness and despair. As the body count rises and the atrocities escalate, Titus is consumed by grief and rage, leading to a climactic showdown that culminates in a shocking and tragic conclusion. Along the way, Shakespeare explores themes of honor, justice, and the nature of humanity, offering a searing indictment of the cycle of violence and the capacity for cruelty that lies within us all.