Macbeth and me
Shakespeare’s Macbeth is as much poem as play. The essence of the drama is not in the action but in the words and in the unfolding of metaphor. It begins … Continue reading
September 28, 2016 · Leave a comment
Poems with stage directions
Samuel Beckett’s plays are not often performed. Waiting for Godot comes along every now and then, but the others, especially the short ones, are as rare as one of those … Continue reading
October 29, 2014 · Leave a comment
A Reader’s Diary, 23 April 2014
We appreciate the modern in Shakespeare and ignore, excuse or improve everything else. It happens to all writers. They go out of fashion soon after they die and wait in … Continue reading
April 23, 2014 · Leave a comment
Modern theatre’s debt to Ben Jonson
Comedies are not easy to read. In tragedy words are everything, in comedy it is the action, the way the characters interact, that matters. Every comedian knows that the laugh … Continue reading
February 5, 2014 · Leave a comment
Neil Rathmell - writer 