At PCS ’s urging, I posted an entry on its blog about an upcoming class I’m teaching soon. Whereupon it occurred to me I serve up the same here on the ole pupu platter. I mean, what does I have a bloggling for, right? Right?? So forgive me if you navigated here from this very announcement at PCS, but as long as you’re at it, why not go ahead and register for the course? Because -- needless to say -- there’s nothing quite like a Jacobean tragedy to make you feel that spring is really here.
Here’s the original post:
----------------------------------------------
You know that PCS boasts a theater school, called GreenHouse, right? I’m proud to say I’ve taught for it twice through our popular “Dialogue” series, in which participants read and discuss masterpieces of dramatic literature. We inaugurated GreenHouse with my “Greatest Hits” class, where we read some of history’s most popular plays (Doctor Faustus and Uncle Tom’s Cabin, for example), and last fall I taught a course on Shakespeare’s romances.
Up for the spring semester: “Murder & Mayhem: Three Macabre Masterpieces of the English Renaissance.” This new course explores something we have in common with Shakespeare’s audiences – our love of scary stories involving vengeful ghosts, damp dungeons, secret passageways and grisly undoings, all served up with a ghoulish sense of fun. These influential dramas prefigure the Gothic romances of the 18th Century as well as the horror movies of our own time.
In this six-session theater appreciation course, we’ll delve into three of the genre’s greatest hits, all of which are still frequently performed today: Hamlet, by William Shakespeare; The Revenger’s Tragedy, by Cyril Tourneur; and The Changeling, by Middleton & Rowley.
I still have room for a few more participants – if you’d like to register, contact Kelsey Tyler soon at kelseyt@pcs.org. For more information about the class and its subject, feel free to phone me at (503) 445-3792.
Course dates: Wednesdays, Apr. 2 – May 21, 7-9 pm
Tuition: $150
I would love to discuss these astonishing plays, with their strangely modern mixtures of suspense and humor, with you.
3 comments:
If a Jacobean tragedy is unavailable, sometimes rain will help me realize Spring is here. But not just any rain. It has to be Spring rain.
One of my favorite lines from PCS's upcoming production of SOMETIMES A GREAT NOTION IS: "It aint no secret that it's gonna rain in Oregon in the winter!" But you're quite right, CC, it is lovely when the constant cold drizzle of the winter gives way to the sparkling surprise showers of spring here.
Aaarrrrrggggghhhh! I love me some Jacobeans and I'm in rehearsals all of April! Drats!
I would have loved to take this course with you, Mead. I'm no lover of Hamlet, but dish me up a hot plate of Revenger's Tragedy and I'm good to go.
Post a Comment