6 Places in Shakespeare, Then and Now
By: J. E. Luebering - Britannica
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
6 Places in Shakespeare, Then and Now
This Encyclopedia Britannica list explores six places as they were in Shakespeare's time and as they are now.
Image: Copyright © 1968 Paramount Pictures Corporation; photograph from a private collection
Like any playwright, William Shakespeare made stuff up. More often than not, though, he used real-life places as the settings for his plays. From England to Egypt, here's what's going on in some of those places today.
Alexandria
The mosque of Ab al-Abbs al-Murs, Alexandria, Egypt. Image: Hisham Ibrahim/Getty Images
Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra sweeps across the Roman Empire, from Sicily to Athens to Egypt and elsewhere around the Mediterranean. Cleopatra's palace, at Alexandria, plays an important role in the play, but the location of its real-life counterpart was unknown until the 1990s, when divers discovered it submerged off the coast of Egypt, where it ended up after earthquakes devastated the island on which it stood centuries ago. Archaeological excavations of the site are ongoing.
Denmark
Kronborg Castle, Helsingr, Denmark. Image: Fritz Henle/Photo Researchers
Hamlet complains that Denmark is a prison and that the castle, Elsinore, in which he and the royal family live is a place of drunkenness and reputation-smearing bad behavior. That castle still exists today: Kronborg Castle, in Helsingr, Denmark. Its construction dates to the 16th century, and in 2000 it was added to UNESCO's list of World Heritage sites.
Rome
Ponte Sant'Angelo, bridge over the Tiber River, Rome . Image: Andreas Tille
In Julius Caesar , Shakespeare did much to render the Roman emperor's death iconic: in the Roman Senate, Caesar is set upon by a group of conspirators who stab him as he cries out, "Et tu, Brute?" to his trusted friend Brutus, who has sided with the schemers. It wasn't until 2012 that archaeologists announced that they had confidently identified the spot where Caesar was killed: the Largo di Torre Argentina, a square in the center of Rome today filled with ancient ruins and stray cats.
Forest of Arden
The wooded hills of the Ardennes in Belgium. Image: Thomas B. Hollyman/Photo Researchers
In As You Like It , after a duke is sent into exile by his usurping brother, he and his supporters end up in the Forest of Arden. It is a place of banishment, but it's also a place of freedom from the constraints of court life. Shakespeare's Forest of Arden had several real-life precedents: the Ardennes forest on mainland Europe was one, but another was the ancient Forest of Arden in Warwickshire, near the town where Shakespeare was born, in Stratford-on-Avon. The forest—which shared a name with Shakespeare's mother, Mary Arden—was small at best in Shakespeare's day and is in little evidence today, although centuries-old trees persist.
Verona
The Ponte Pietra over the Adige River at Verona, Italy. Image: E. Streichan/Shostal Associates
Things didn't end well for Romeo and Juliet in Verona: a misunderstanding prompts Romeo to drink poison, despair prompts Juliet to stab herself. Shakespeare wasn't the only person to tell this story—he drew on a popular legend about star-crossed lovers in Italy that was well known in England—but he helped it to live on for centuries. Today thousands of letters addressed to Juliet still arrive in Verona, each telling tales of romantic woe; the Juliet Club there replies to them all.
Venice
Rialto Bridge, Venice, designed and built by Antonio da Ponte. Image: © Mikhail Rulkov/Shutterstock.com
Shakespeare's Venice, as seen in The Merchant of Venice , is a dark place, full of rumors and scheming and threatened violence. In that play, the title character's fate is determined in a courtroom, but much of the action takes place in Venice's streets, amidst torchbearers and masked partygoers and gondolas and talk of business on the Rialto. Today, Venice is a major draw for tourism. The Rialto is still a bustling hub, known for its markets. The famous Rialto Bridge, traveled millions of times since Shakespeare's play was written, was scheduled for extensive repairs and renovation starting in 2014.
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I wasn't entirely sure which of my Discovery or Literature groups I should have posted this under, but Britannica posted it under Arts and Culture rather than Geography and Travel, so it belongs better under the Literature group, which is okay, since at this time it is the only one of my active groups that wasn't represented on the Front (Home) Page most likely because its articles are not particularly popular on NT (and I don't intend to make a comment about that at this time).