Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare Unlimited Podcast
1) Juliet, Then and Now, with Sophie Duncan
Was Romeo and Juliet your first brush with Shakespeare? Whether it was on stage, on screen in films by Franco Zeffirelli or Baz Luhrmann or Shonda Rhimes' Still Star-Crossed, or in the pages of the Fo...Show More
2) Spain's Golden Age of Theater
While Shakespeare was reshaping English drama, a parallel theatrical revolution was unfolding in Spain. During the Spanish Golden Age, playwright Lope de Vega pioneered the comedia nueva, a bold new d...Show More
3) The Strange History of Samuel Pepys's Diary
Why does Samuel Pepys’s diary still matter 200 years after it was first published? In her new book, The Strange History of Samuel Pepys’s Diary, historian Kate Loveman examines how Pepys’s extraordina...Show More
4) Celebrating Elizabethan Cooking, with Sam Bilton
What did people really eat in Shakespeare’s England? In her new book, Much Ado About Cooking, food historian Sam Bilton uncovers the vibrant and surprising world of early modern cuisine—where sugar wa...Show More
5) Hamnet, with Chloe Zhao and Maggie O'Farrell
Hamnet, the acclaimed novel by Maggie O’Farrell, is now a major film. The story imagines the life and death of Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet, whose loss would later echo through one of his most famous tra...Show More
6) London's First Playhouse and Shakespeare
Before Shakespeare became a literary icon, he was a working writer trying to earn a living in an emerging and often precarious new industry. In The Dream Factory: London’s First Playhouse and the Maki...Show More
7) Mary, Queen of Scots, with Jade Scott
Imprisoned for nearly 20 years by her cousin Queen Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots, fought her battles through words, sending and receiving coded letters hidden in books, garments, and even beer bar...Show More
8) Richard Burbage and the Shakespearean Stage
Long before Shakespeare became a household name, there was Richard Burbage. As the first actor to play Hamlet, Macbeth, Richard III, and King Lear, Burbage helped define what it meant to be a Shakespe...Show More
9) Harriet Walter: New Words for Shakespeare's Women
Shakespeare’s plays are filled with unforgettable women—but too often, their voices are cut short. Ophelia never gets to defend herself. Gertrude never explains her choices. Lady Anne surrenders to Ri...Show More
10) Stephen Greenblatt on Christopher Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare were both born in 1564, rising from working-class origins finding success in the new world of the theater. But before Shakespeare transformed English drama,...Show More