Ben Broadribb on the Belfast BSA Conference

21st June 2018

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The British Shakespeare Association held their biennial-until-next-year-when-it-becomes-annual conference at Queen’s University in Belfast last week. The conference ran from Thursday 14th to Sunday 17th June 2018, and I was lucky enough to attend for the entirety of the four days. So, in no particular order, and in a loose tribute to an enduring teen screen Shakespeare favourite, here are my ten things I loved about everyone and everything at BSA Belfast:

1. The welcoming atmosphere
   This was my first BSA conference, as well as my first ‘big’ academic conference. It’s fair to say that, whilst very excited to attend, I was also quite nervous and a little unsure of what to expect. It almost goes without saying that I needn’t have been worried: from the moment I arrived, the conference was characterised by a genuinely warm and convivial vibe from the organisers and attendees alike. The importance of this can’t be understated for someone like me, a first-timer still finding their feet in academia when entering a room of highly-respected names from around the world.
2. The sense of equality
   This follows on from the first point, but deserves its own entry on this list. It was incredibly heartening to find myself amongst seasoned doctors, professors, academics and practitioners, and to see me and my fellow PhD researchers be continuously treated as equals. In every conversation I was part of or party to, those who have worked their way to the top of the academic tree were genuinely eager to hear about and support the work of those of us at the start of our journey. Just wonderful.
3. The first session
   The supportive atmosphere was instigated from the get-go thanks to a workshop entitled Getting Your Research Out There, which offered invaluable advice and guidance about turning a thesis into a book, chapters for edited collections, articles and ‘pivots’ (longer than an article, shorter than a monograph). There were also some brilliant tips for getting paper abstracts accepted for conferences from Eoin Price — particularly helpful as he’s heading up the organisation of next year’s BSA conference in Swansea.
4. The food
   Corinne Furness, my fellow SI doctoral researcher who chaired this year’s British Graduate Shakespeare Conference (or BritGrad to its friends), wisely made the observation to me earlier this year that getting the food arrangements right at a conference is a big deal — people remember if they ate well, but they also don’t forget if they didn’t! BSA Belfast definitely got this right, from the wine and canapés reception on the first evening to the fantastic celebratory dinner at Titanic Belfast.
5. The online conference
   The generous, detailed and heartfelt interaction between many BSA participants on Twitter using the #BSABelfast18 hashtag meant a second fascinating layer of the conference was continuously happening online. It was also lovely to put faces to online aliases, meeting so many people in person after first interacting with them over Twitter before and during the conference. If you were ever in doubt that social media really can be an incredibly positive force, just ask anyone who tweeted during the conference. A special tip of the hat to those who live-tweeted so much of the four days — it’s a skill I know I will never have, so I bow down before your expert concision and pollical prowess!
6. The papers
   Listening to fellow PhD students speak about their research is something I’ve enjoyed the most since becoming part of the postgraduate community. This was no different at BSA Belfast, with each panel I attended offering the chance to hear researchers from across the globe speak on a huge range of topics with infectious enthusiasm. With up to nine panels scheduled at once, there were some very tough decisions to make on which papers to hear, but thanks to the Twitterspeareans mentioned above a great many speakers had the essence of their presentations captured online for those who missed out. Special thanks to those who came to hear my paper on Saturday afternoon, and also to those who presented alongside me — I really enjoyed the whole experience!
7. The seminars
   As this was the first year seminar sessions ran at a BSA conference, they’re likely to have been a new experience for quite a few conference attendees, including me. The decision between attending Shakespeare on Film and Shakespeare, Performance and the 21st Century, both of which had oodles to offer me in relation to my research, was undoubtedly the most difficult programme choice I had to make. I ultimately plumped for the former and was happy with my choice, although I genuinely wish I could have somehow bent the laws of time and space been at both! The discussions between those who had submitted papers for circulation at the seminar was fascinating, lively and respectful, even when opposing views were being argued. Taking part looked daunting as an auditor observing; but the opportunity to take part in an extended discussion with both doctoral researchers and experienced academics would be invaluable, so I’m eager to take part in a seminar session myself at a future conference.
8. The plenaries
   I’m still a conference newbie, but I already know that not every plenary session will speak to my direct research interests, and that these can at times feel less engaging. Not so at BSA Belfast: the conference had superb plenaries closely linked to my research from Courtney Lehmann and Pascale Aebischer; but honestly, every plenary had me utterly enthralled. Two highlights out of a flawless programme were Ayanna Thompson’s mesmerising analysis of Deutsches Theater Berlin’s extraordinary (in every sense) production of Othello, and Richard Dutton’s enigmatic masterclass examining the original casting of the early modern play The Second Part Of The Seven Deadly Sins.
9. The films
   Unsurprisingly considering my mild obsession with film and Shakespeare, the opportunity to see premiere UK screenings of recent Shakespearean films was a particular highlight of the conference for me. Veeram offered a vibrant and aestheticised Indian adaptation of Macbeth on Saturday afternoon. Before that, however, Hermia & Helena provided a less straightforward, at times surreal appropriation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. A fascinating discussion with director Matías Piñeiro straight afterwards offered some extra insight into the filmmaker’s process, as well as covering such topics as the other Shakespeare plays he’d like to adapt, and why he’s not so keen on Woody Allen’s back catalogue. Mia Hewitt also deserves a special mention for her flawless hosting of the Q&A session with Piñeiro.
10. The memories
    Okay, a bit of an intentionally vague tenth reason to allow me to mention anything else I haven’t already. Deal with it: my blog, my rules.
    In all seriousness, the invaluable memories of my time at BSA Belfast will stay with me for a long, long time. I can’t overstate the importance to me personally to have been afforded such wonderful opportunities to support, interact and socialise with so many people from the global Shakespeare community. As a part-time researcher who returned to higher education after several years away, and who doesn’t live close to my institute of study, I still sometimes feel — or perhaps, more accurately, convince myself — that I’m something of an interloper in the academic community. My time at the BSA conference steadfastly proved to me that this isn’t the case (well duh!), gifting me with a priceless uninterrupted few days to forge new friendships and allow existing ones to be further cemented. I know in my heart that I made some friends for life during the few days I spent in Belfast. The only thing that could have been better? Winning the pub quiz on Thursday night instead of coming second. If only we’d played our Joker on the Film & TV round as originally planned…

A huge thank-you once again to everyone at Queen’s University Belfast who made the 2018 British Shakespeare Conference the incredible success that it was, and particularly to conference organiser Dr. Ramona Wray.

BSA 2019 at Swansea University

16th June 2018

The British Shakespeare Association and Swansea University

are delighted to announce that the 2019 annual conference of the British Shakespeare Association

will take place from:

17th to 20th July 2019

The theme is

‘race and nation’;

a Call for Papers will be released in due course.

We can already reveal the first plenary speaker to be

Kim F. Hall,

Lucyle Hook Professor of English and Professor Africana Studies at Barnard College, Colombia University.

Call for Conference Organizers: BSA 2021

16th June 2018

The British Shakespeare Association welcomes applications from institutions to host the British Shakespeare Association conference in 2021. This is the largest regular Shakespeare conference in the United Kingdom, bringing together researchers, teachers and theatre practitioners to share the latest work on Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

The conference is the highest profile activity organised by the BSA, and draws delegates from around the world. The local organising team is a vital part of the BSA’s mission, and will receive full support from the BSA board, which has over a decade’s experience of overseeing these events. The conference team benefit from the full infrastructural support of the BSA, including its mailing lists, professional contacts and organisational advice.

Please contact Susan Anderson (susan.anderson@shu.ac.uk), the head of the BSA’s events committee, with any expressions of interest.

‘Why Shakespeare?’ Launching the BSA’s Performance and Media Branch

16th June 2018

In collaboration with the Actor’s Centre, the British Shakespeare Association is proud to present:

Why Shakespeare?

13 October 2018

The Actors Centre, 1A Tower St, London WC2H 9NP

Why do we keep producing and performing Shakespeare on stage, screen and film? What incentives and difficulties does Shakespeare present to you as an independent practitioner or member of a company, small or large? In your specialist role as a performer, designer, stage manager, fight director, dancer, director, producer, company manager, maker of film, television or screen games, does Shakespeare offer unique opportunities and challenges? Do you want to be in the room where Shakespeare happens? If so, why?

‘Why Shakespeare?’ is a free event combining practical workshops and interactive discussions to celebrate the launch of a new performance and media branch of the British Shakespeare Association. By exploring some of these questions, we aim to learn how the British Shakespeare Association might best support the community of performance practitioners, to whom we are offering free membership of the BSA.

Finally, longer term aim: to conduct a national survey of all the Shakespeare being produced in theatres / by touring companies across the country and to apply for funding to compile this information as an archive and go and interview practitioners as they are in production or rehearsing. Such an archive would then be of use to theatre historians as well as practitioners seeking advice / inspiration / caution!

More details will be published shortly…

CFP: Barton, Hall and Shakespeare

7th June 2018

Members of the BSA may be interested in the following CFP for a conference co-sponsored by the BSA.

BARTON, HALL AND SHAKESPEARE

ROSE THEATRE KINGSTON-UPON-THAMES

SEPTEMBER 7 / 8 2018

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Kingston Shakespeare Seminar and British Shakespeare Association announce a conference to celebrate and explore the work of John Barton and Peter Hall, focused on their productions of Shakespeare. The aim of this commemorative event will be to bring together theatre practitioners, scholars, critics and audience members from around the world, to reconsider the achievements of the two great Shakespeare directors. The venue will be the Shakespearean auditorium of the Rose Theatre that saw some of Peter Hall’s last productions, and John Barton’s final public appearance at Trevor Nunn’s restaging of their Wars of the Roses.

Proposals are invited for 25-minute presentations on all aspects of the lives and work of Barton and Hall, including work in film, TV and opera. Presentations will be particularly welcome on their productions in relation to the Cambridge intellectual background; Stratford institutional environment; British political context; international reception; performance practice; verse speaking; place of the text; impact on literary and theatre criticism; influence on drama teaching and training; input of composers and designers; role of the director; archival heritage; and conception of Shakespeare.

Proposals of up to 200 words, together with a brief cv., should be sent by July 31 to Professor Richard Wilson at r.wilson@kingston.ac.uk

Othello on Trial

15th May 2018

Members of the BSA may be interested in the following BSA-sponsored event:

Law on Trial 2018: Othello on Trial

Monday 11th June 2018

Reception: 6pm
Performance: 6.15pm
Symposium Discussion: 7.30-8.30pm

Hamlet. The Macbeths, of course. Richard 111 — they’ve all been tried for murder in modern-day criminal courts. But what of Othello, Shakespeare’s notorious wife-killer? How has he escaped prosecution?

Othello on Trial puts him on trial for murder at the Old Bailey. He has a lawyer and the best available defence. There’s a prosecutor and a judge with the audience taking the role of jurors in Act 2 which doubles as an open forum to discuss the key issues. Is his crime murder or manslaughter? Should extreme emotions — ‘being wrought/Perplexed in the extreme’ as Othello puts it (‘seeing red’ as 21st-century wife-killers put it) — mitigate murder today?

This is the first play in a planned Theatre in Education trilogy that recruits Shakespeare for a project designed to encourage young people to engage critically and actively with the social problem of continuing high levels of violence against women and girls in the UK. Weaving scenes from Shakespeare’s Othello, his uncannily timely ‘domestic’ tragedy about a man’s homicidal rage against his wife, with excerpts from historic and contemporary trials of wife killers, Othello on Trial dramatises the still pervasive problem of intimate partner femicide.

Convenors

Adrian Howe is an Associate Lecturer in Criminology at Birkbeck. Othello on Trial is the first play in a planned public engagement theatre project. Her publications include Sex, Violence and Crime—Foucault and the ‘Man’ Question and (with Daniela Alaattinoğlu), Contesting Feminism — Feminism and the Power of Law Revisited (Routledge forthcoming).

Tanya Serisier is a Lecturer in Criminology at Birkbeck. She researches in the field of feminist politics and sexual violence.

This event is sponsored by the School of Law, Birkbeck, the Public Engagement department at Birkbeck and the British Shakespeare Association.

This event is free however booking is required via this page.

Please note that latecomers will not be admitted. Please be advised that photographs may be taken at the event.

2018 Honorary Fellowship Awarded

14th May 2018

The BSA is delighted to announce the election of our new Honorary Fellow for 2018: Roger Harcourt. Roger is a giant in the world of Shakespearean Education. A teacher for the whole of his life, he has touched thousands of young people with his immense experience and insights. He has given the greatest gift any educator can give to his students: inspiration. Such a gift to these many young Shakespeareans (and it is he who made them so) is inestimable.

Worldly fame, celebrity, are too often the guide as to where excellence lies. But Roger’s commitment, passion, joy, expertise and achievements in passing on the torch of inspiration to generations of young students is clearly the truest measure. To celebrate a lifetime’s achievement of excellence in the Shakespearean world is our remit for the bestowing of an Honorary Fellowship. And it is wonderful that we can celebrate Roger and the Shakespearean constituency that he has represented with such distinction.

Andrew Jarvis, Chair of the BSA Fellowship Committee

Shakespeare and Sci-Fi Conference Report

11th May 2018

By Powder Thompson, PhD candidate, Anglia Ruskin University

Anglia Ruskin University’s Centre for Science Fiction and Fantasy held a conference on Shakespeare and Science Fiction on 28 April 2018 in Cambridge. Papers on all aspects of the intersection between Shakespeare and science fiction were invited, and presenters ranged from creative writers to noted critics to researchers at all stages of their careers. The event was organised by Sarah Annes Brown, Professor of English Literature at Anglia Ruskin, and was sponsored by the British Shakespeare Association.

Sarah Brown opened the conference with an informal paper, ‘Shakespeare and Time Travel’. Multiple versions of Shakespeare in popular culture, from television to books, were examined, most notably the Bard’s appearances on the internationally-popular Doctor Who. Brown ended on a thought that would form a common thread throughout the day: each generation or age creates its own idea or version of Shakespeare.

With that idea, however, comes the question, will Shakespeare remain relevant as the inexorable march of time places his works at a further and further remove? Many science fiction writers have pondered this, but their conclusions are mixed. On the one hand, Shakespeare is often included in works portraying the near and far future. However, the understanding or appreciation of Shakespeare does not always survive along with his words. Examples of this occurred in papers given by Berit Åström (Umeå University) and Margaret Maurer (University of North Carolina), specifically looking at Shakespeare’s presence in Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven, as well as Professor Peter Byrne’s (Kent State University) paper examining interpretations of Macbeth by the characters in the video game Fallout 4. The general consensus seemed to be that Shakespeare, when removed from cultural context (either by time or by an apocalyptic event), becomes absurd, rather than sacred.

That idea of the sacredness of Shakespeare, an idea that is strongly relevant in our current cultural context, feeds into another topic that recurred throughout the day: how Shakespeare is often used in the works that incorporate him or his plays to signal value, either of the new work or of certain characters in the story. In Station Eleven, for example, characters who enjoy or understand Shakespeare inevitably turn out to be good, and those who dislike or cannot appreciate Shakespeare are inevitably revealed as flawed in some way. Similarly, in many works of science fiction, Shakespeare is portrayed as the greatest of humanity, or the most human of humans. This is often the case in Doctor Who, as Brown noted. Philip Aijian (University of California, Irvine) extended the idea further in his examination of Shakespeare in the movie Star Trek VI, where Shakespeare can almost be read as standing in for a higher level of universal being-hood, a humanity that transcends species. ‘You have not experienced Shakespeare until you have read him in the original Klingon.’

Also engaging with ideas of sacredness and humanity was keynote speaker Roger Christofides (University of Liverpool) in his paper ‘In the face of the fabulous new: Hamlet in the uncanny valley’. Christofides suggested the nonhuman parts of Hamlet were ‘revisiting spectres’, once-human things that, with their humanity stripped away, nonetheless still allow us to see our humanity therein. Using the analogy of Yorick’s skull as a classical memento mori, and the fleshless Terminator endoskeleton as an artificial equivalent, Christofides also argued that if Yorick’s skull signifies the Christian Judgement, the Terminator’s skull signifies the coming technological apocalypse. ‘In the face of the fabulous new, your only thought is to kill it.’

The keynote paper marked the midpoint of the conference day. After a break for lunch, the event resumed with a panel of two papers that both touched on another common theme of the day: repurposing or rereading Shakespeare. Further, that idea of repurposing or rereading was itself a part of a larger current of interest in the various ways Shakespeare is used in science fiction.

Sarah Waters (Oxford Brookes) examined C. S. Lewis’ use of Shakespeare, noting the author’s repeated engagement with and rereadings of The Tempest. Lauren Rohrs (Notre Dame University), joined the conference via Skype, and laid out the clear and convincing parallels between Lavinia of Titus Andronicus and Emilio Sandoz of Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow. Each of these papers engaged with a different mode of repurposing Shakespeare. The first was more concerned with an essentially literary, or scholarly, engagement with Shakespeare, the second with purposeful borrowing to make a point regarding modern treatment of rape survivors.

More direct usages of Shakespearean material were explored by Powder Thompson (Anglia Ruskin University) who examined those characters in Disney’s Gargoyles which were taken directly from Shakespeare (Titania, Macbeth, and Oberon all make regular appearances). By contrast, independent scholar Steven Sautter noted in ‘The Tempest and the Time Lord’ that a number of science fictional works come by their Shakespearean influences secondhand. Forbidden Planet and Brave New World are both directly indebted to Shakespeare, but a much larger number of works are indebted to them, and the Shakespearean influence passed on indirectly.

Copies of copies tend to lose definition, and this analogy extends to Shakespeare as well. Both Kinga Földváry (Pázmány Péter Catholic University) and Ronan Hatfull (University of Warwick) looked closely at what Hatfull referred to as ‘fragments of Shakespearean dust’ in modern cinematic works. Földváry explored the scattered pieces of Shakespearean dialogue appearing throughout Westworld and concluded the repurposing here was a usage without any kind of deep textual awareness. Lines were stripped of their original dramatic context and a new meaning was applied, but the act was one of appropriation or textual poaching, rather than one of additive meaning.

Hatfull’s examination of the presence of the Shakespearean in the Marvel Cinematic Universe extended to production detail, exploring the choice of actors and directors known for their work with Shakespeare and what their experience of the Bard brought to different movies. Thor was a notable example, with its heightened dialogue and the cinematic direction of Kenneth Branagh.

Closing remarks were given by John Clute, co-editor of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Clute made a point of Shakespeare’s unique emplacedness, and highlighted the different modes of writing Shakespeare employed throughout his career. Clute criticised the trend towards more superficial uses of Shakespeare in works of modern science fiction and called for deeper readings and critical engagement.

A wine and canape reception followed the closing remarks. Conference delegates continued discussion and engagement with the ideas presented throughout the day. All in all, it seems that all’s well that ends well. Many thanks to the BSA for their help with funding this event!

Much Ado About Nothing Colloquium Report

11th May 2018

Ben Haworth received a BSA bursary to attend the  Much Ado About Nothing Colloquium at the Rose Theatre in Kingston upon Thames on 21 April 2018. He offers below a short report on the event.

This brief yet superbly compact colloquium allowed both academic and public circles to interact, debate, and consider both the text and performance of Much Ado. The advantages of combining the release of Arden’s Critical Approaches to the play with a contemporary performance opened the way for a nuanced and multifaceted critical methodology. The innovative and inclusive structure, a more organic and open format than similarly staged events, saw three panels of academics openly discussing and engaging with each other as well as the audience on the topics of sex and gender, family and intergenerational tensions, and comedy and the watch. An additional panel, where the director and cast members from the concurrent production at the Rose Theatre were engaged by the audience, led to discussions around some textually insightful and politically relevant features of the play in performance.

My own research on liminality and subversion in early modern drama has increasingly been shaped by such conferences and performances, as actors living with the texts and inside of their roles often become aware of nuances that may be hinted at but are never explicit. Some of the dichotomies that emerged from discussions, on both academic and performer panels, were of light versus dark, ritual versus play, and authority and courtly vision versus human fallibility, choice and ambiguity. The on-going relevance of such conferences lies in their ability to bring together the very latest in textual, theoretical, and performance analyses to demonstrate how Renaissance playwrights negotiated these often-controversial themes in the space of the stage.

Statement on the UCU Strike Action over Pensions

16th March 2018

In our capacity as trustees of the BSA, we state our concern for the current dispute over proposed changes to the USS pension scheme.  Although these changes will not affect the majority of our diverse membership directly, we nevertheless consider them a threat to the future of teaching and research about Shakespeare. The erosion of a secure pension scheme will  inevitably make academic careers less attractive to a younger generation of Shakespeare researchers who will lead future thinking and share this with communities of teachers, theatre practitioners, and the wider public. With this in mind, we publicly state our personal support for the UCU strike and encourage all our members to do the same.

Alison Findlay (Chair)

José Pérez Díez

Paul Prescott

Gabriel Egan

Susan Anderson

Elizabeth Glyn

Eleanor Rycroft

Karin Brown

Ramona Wray

Karen Eckersall

Brett Greatley-Hirsch

James Harriman-Smith