Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | Friday Review | Young World | Property Plus | Quest | Folio |

TIME OUT

In Bard's own country

INDU BALACHANDRAN

You'll bump into many figures of speech in the surprising and idyllic Stratford-Upon-Avon.

PHOTO: SHUBHA PRIYA

THE POET'S PLACE: Stratford-upon-Avon.

I HAD a score to settle with William Shakespeare.

Years ago, as a punishment in school, I had to learn by heart overnight the entire soliloquy of Lady Macbeth's "Is this a dagger that I see before me?" I would have gladly daggered Shakespeare himself.

More than 30 years later, I was standing in hushed silence right at his grave, in an ancient chapel in the picturesque Stratford-upon-Avon. Reading his epitaph, (written by himself naturally) it was clear that Shakespeare wanted no messing around with him, dead or alive. "Blest be the man that spares these stones. And curst be he that moves my bones".

With typical Indian reverence, I wondered whether I should be standing there with my shoes — even as a knot of jabbering Japanese tourists entered and immediately started click-clicking their Shakespeare experience into their biscuit-sized Nikons — and rushed away with hardly a pause. What was their connect to Shakespeare, I wondered.

Mine, I knew, was as deep as it can get — just as with any English convent educated child in India. We grew up knowing much more about Shakespeare than about Kabir or Kalidas. We could still recall the exact sound of the voice of our English teacher, reading us Hamlet's famous contemplation, or Shylock's evil rant. We'd worn the legal gowns of Portia, and the donkey-head of Bottom in school plays. Like mine, was this a pilgrimage trip for the Japanese too? Or just a big tick mark in the Japanese translation of "1000 places to see before you die"?

Back to the beginning

But I have jumped too soon to Shakespeare's grave. Our tour of Stratford-Upon-Avon logically started with the Birthplace Home — an extraordinary museum filled with both original and replica items from the 1500s that recreates Shakespeare's youth.

Birthplace Home

With safe words like "in all probability" and "it is believed that" prefixing many sentences, the guide pointed out how young Will slept (probably) and ate (perhaps) and played in his youth (presumably). That is why it was a gooseflesh moment to see his name very clearly and definitely recorded in an ancient baptism register — opened and displayed right before our eyes. Shakespeare's name was written against the date April 26, 1564. That means he was born a few days earlier — so April 23rd was Shakespeare's birth date.

Well, so it is assumed... Later when we saw that Shakespeare also died on April 23rd (1616), it was easy to see why historians settled on this perfect date as the birth date too. Or as Shakespeare himself may have said of this amazing coincidence: "Heaven hath a hand in these events" ("Richard II").

With a dad who made gloves for a living, where on earth did Shakespeare get his astonishing writing gene, we wondered.

Looking for clues to his genius, we walked around; and read the interesting panels tracing his life. "Shakespeare rarely invented his basic plots," revealed one. He borrowed heavily from history and mythology, and embellished them with high drama, wit and human emotion. We also heard stories our English teacher never told us: young Will, just 18, had got his girlfriend Anne, 26 (an older woman!), pregnant, and did the honourable thing marrying her. An easy thing to do as Anne was a rich and comely lass who went on to bear him a daughter and a set of twins. The exhibition also gave us a peek into Will's will: apparently he left his second best bed to his wife! (The best was always reserved for guests... ) Stepping into the bedroom to see a replica of the grand Hathaway Bed, we heard even more intriguing trivia. Notice the beds are somewhat tiny? asked our guide. Well, (it is believed) that people slept sitting up, as it was easier on the digestive system! But a more practical reason was their perpetual fear of fires, and a sitting position would ensure a faster getaway. Or even a fear far worse: the devil may assume you are lying dead and snatch you away.

Curious customs

Long curtains around the four-poster bed were designed for some privacy, as alongside were smaller cots where the younger children slept. Our guide also pointed out a curious U-shaped wooden object and demonstrated its use — a quick turn with this made the cords of the bed tighter and firmer. Leading to the expression we use: "Goodnight. Sleep tight!"

Soon, wherever we went we bumped into more everyday phrases — and found their delightful origin to be from either the Bard or his times. Our lunch halt had taken us to Bensons with the best soups and salads in town, and right alongside in the Shakespeare curio shop, I found a plaque with "In my salad days, when I was green in judgement". "Salad days" came from Shakespeare? Yes, from "Anthony and Cleopatra". But this one really got me: 300 years before Charles Dickens was even born, Shakespeare came up with "what the dickens is his name... " (Go look it up in your complete works of Shakespeare: it's there in "The Merry Wives of Windsor".)

A poet's hangouts

Continuing our tour of the idyllic Bard's country, we went along roads that Shakespeare would've hung around, wooing Anne 400 years ago. We learnt why "a June bride" has come to be such a desirable thing: in Elizabethan times, people had only one real bath a year — usually in June. Understandable that any union was best celebrated then. But Shakespeare wasn't allowed to wait that long: the marriage was hurriedly solemnised by November. As evidenced by a marriage license issued in November 1582, which curiously spells his name as "Shagspeare"! And if in their passion they had "not slept one wink", oh yes, Shakespeare first used that expression too, in "Cymbeline".

More phrases lay lurking in every street corner. Our guide took us to well preserved ancient Tudor homes, like that of Elizabeth Arden, Shakespeare's mother. Richer people, like Shakespeare's parents, normally had larger windows to let in more daylight (and subtly show off their lifestyle). But they soon began to board them up to look smaller, as a sudden "window tax" was levied on rich homes — an event that led to the coining of "daylight robbery"! Another one: the chimney those days was just a hole in the thatched roof and you'd be lucky if nothing inedible fell into the pot... Pot luck?

Right answer. And apparently, salt was a scarce and expensive item then, to add to that pot. And good soldiers of that time were often rewarded with sacks of salt. We guessed the phrase coming up: "worth his salt".

One of Shakespeare's houses.

Even though Shakespeare wrote almost all his works in London, it was easy to see that the incredibly romantic Stratford was his muse for writing sonnets. In the Shakespeare-themed Bancroft Gardens, with statues of the best known of Shakespearean characters — Hamlet, Falstaff, Prince Hal and Lady Macbeth — I sat watching swans on the lake, almost to a Tchaikovskian rhythm. Altogether, too much of a good thing. (Apparently Shakespeare said that first too. In "As You Like It".)

With Shakespeare coming out of our ears — and mouth (I couldn't help showing off to our guide, how perfectly I could recite "Is this a dagger... ") — it was the ultimate finale to our Shakespearean holiday to watch a stage performance of "Henry VI" at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, sitting enthralled in the best seats of the house.

In the midst of action

Designed to be exactly like the original Shakespearean "thrust theatre" with a part of the stage going right into the audience, the play was overwhelming for its proximity to the action, no matter where one sat. Swashbuckling characters suddenly ran right past us, dripping blood in battle scenes, or swung down dramatically from castle ramparts, or even disappeared into the floor of the stage in a haze of smoke — effects to rival the best of Broadway or Westend. We felt incredibly lucky to have caught the year-long "Complete Works" Festival where every single one of Shakespeare's 37 plays were being staged for the first time ever in one big event! With Hollywood actors like Dame Judi Dench and Patrick Stewart playing major roles in "The Merry Wives of Windsor" and "The Tempest", this was a feast indeed, and the greatest hurrah to the world's best-known playwright.

Walking back to our cosy Eastnor Hotel, (everywhere and everything is within walking distance here), I thought: you couldn't be a theatre lover and not visit Stratford.

Then again I thought, you couldn't be a literature lover and not visit Stratford.

Just then I watched a couple in a boat go gliding along the dreamy river Avon, with swans in the twilight making it all just unbearably beautiful.

And I thought, you couldn't be in love and not visit Stratford.

Quick facts