BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Jeanie
Date: 19 Jul 05 - 10:08 AM

For anyone interested, a new book on this subject was published this April: "Pronouncing Shakespeare" by David Crystal (Cambridge University Press). It describes last year's experiment at Shakespeare's Globe in which for 3 days in June their "original practices" production of "Romeo & Juliet" also included using the original pronunciation - which they are repeating this year with another play.

As regards the Brummy or Midlands accent, I seem to remember reading that there are several slang expressions used in Shakespeare which still occur in Midlands dialects to this day. I was in a production of "The Merchant of Venice" with a Brummie who told me that Gobbo (as in the name of the character Launcelot Gobbo) is still a popular nickname in the Midlands, and if you were coming out of a football match in the Birmingham area and called out "Eh, Gobbo !" several heads would turn to look to see if you were calling them.

- jeanie

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 19 Jul 05 - 09:59 AM

Ah, but he was also very good at writing accents.

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Shanghaiceltic
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 07:12 PM

As the Bard came from just outside Brum should the plays really be performed with a nice Brummy accent?

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Peace
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 04:04 PM

Middle English was a thing of the past when Shakespeare wrote. We know that some words were pronounced differently--check his sonnets. However, the language is still pretty much the same. The 'great vowel shift' was happening during the Bard's time--according to Jespersen (sp?), it occurred from the 14th to 18th centuries, and that affected the way the language was both spoken and heard. The 'great consonant shift' had already happened (8th-10th centuries) and coincided with the begining of the Middle English period and the end of the Old English period. I hazard that most people will encounter no more difficulty with 'Elizabethan English' as used by Shakespeare than they do with Shakespeare as we have heard him presented by actors with all kindsa accents. IMO.

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 03:50 PM

Pity they haven't used Cumbrian or Tyneside.

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: Amos
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 02:29 PM

They weren't Australian accents at the time. They're saying that what Elizabethan actors osunded like would sound, today, like a mix of those things as they sound today. Like saying an ancient mastodon was like a mix of an elephant and a brontosaurus and a Yorkeshire terrier (because it was hairy).

Hope this helps! :D

A

Subject: RE: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 02:28 PM

I suspect they meant that the dialect used would be a mix of the current accents - since there are areas of the US that linguists BELIEVE use vowel sounds closer to Elizabethean English then not. Ditto Australia.

Subject: BS: Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan English
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Jul 05 - 02:21 PM

I'm a bit puzzled by an article in today's paper. The Globe Theatre have decided to do Shakespeare plays in the original Elizabethan English - so the actors are learning to speak with, and I quote, "accents that would have been heard on the Elizabethan stage - a mix of West Country, Scottish, Irish, American and Austalian". Did American and Australian accents exist in 1601?? I think not.. or did they already exist in the UK and were taken to the US and Australia? I always thought that American and Ozzie accents evolved in those countries so they could hardly have been spoken in Elizabethan England. My history's not too great so I don't know if Brits were coming and going between the US and UK in 1601 but I'm sure that Australia hadn't yet been settled - (or discovered?)- other than by the original inhabitants....