meanings CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT The UQ Node, ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions, Europe 1100 - 1800 presents an event for Secondary School Teachers in Humanities “ROMEO AND JULIET & SHAKESPEARE AND CREATIVITY” EWAN FERNIE PETER HOLBROOK Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham UQ Node, Centre for the History of Emotions Date: Monday, 27 April, 2015 Time: 4:30 pm Location: Room 275, Global Change Institute (Bldg 20), UQ St Lucia campus RSVP: [email protected] (07) 3365-4913 Please register by Friday 20 April Free, All Welcome In an attempt to cast fresh light on Romeo and Juliet, Ewan Fernie will ap- proach this familiar masterpiece from some almost wilfully oblique angles. Why does Shakespeare turn ‘Freetown’ from the mere, meaningless name of a posh villa into a real place and prospect where justice will be done? Who are the male Valentines that are slated to come with Mercutio and Tybalt to Capulet’s momentous ball, and where do they disappear to? How does Mercutio’s furious negativity relate to Romeo and Juliet’s more posi- tive passion? One of the most notable features of Shakespeare’s writing is its sheer va- riety – it has been well said of Shakespeare that his is an “art of contrast”. Following on from Professor Fernie’s presentation, Peter Holbrook will lead a discussion about the range of poetic styles employed in Romeo and Juliet. What is the purpose and effect of such contrast? Does it somehow add up to a distinctive vision of the nature of reality – a “philosophy”, in other words? And how might variety in Shakespeare connect to the description of him offered by the German writer Heinrich Heine (1797- Image: Francesco Hayez, L’ultimo bacio dato a Giulietta da Romeo (1823) 1856): that Shakespeare was “the great heathen”? In the second part of the workshop, Peter Holbrook and Ewan Fernie will PETER HOLBROOK is Director of the UQ Node of the ARC talk about the new Masters program in Shakespeare and Creativity – Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions. He is the au- a collaboration with the RSC at The Other Place – which Professor Fernie thor of essays on the influence of Shakespeare on a range of convenes in Stratford-upon-Avon. They will also screen a playful explora- modern writers, including (for example) Friedrich Nietzsche, tion of Shakespeare’s role in society written, directed and performed by Thomas Hardy, Karl Marx, and Philip Larkin. His books include the first cohort of students on this pioneering programme. Shakespeare’s Individualism (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer- sity Press, 2010) and Literature and Degree in Renaissance EWAN FERNIE is Chair, Professor and Fellow at the Shakespeare Institute, England: Nashe, Bourgeois Tragedy, Shakespeare (Newark University of Birmingham, Stratford-upon-Avon, where he co-convenes N.J. and London: University of Delaware Press, 1994); his Ideas the pioneering MA in Shakespeare and Creativity and helps run the collab- of Freedom: English Renaissance Tragedy will appear with oration with the RSC at The Other Place. He is General Editor (with Simon Bloomsbury in 2015. Peter is currently Chair of the Executive Palfrey) of the Shakespeare Now! series, and his latest critical book is The Committee of the International Shakespeare Association, Demonic: Literature and Experience. Fernie also writes creatively. He led which will hold its 10th World Shakespeare Congress in Strat- the AHRC grant-winning project which culminated in Redcrosse, a new po- ford-upon-Avon and London in the summer of 2016. etic liturgy for St George’s Day that was performed in major UK cathedrals and by the RSC, and published in 2012. He is currently completing a Please register for this event by email to Penny Boys at Macbeth novel (also with Palfrey), and beginning to develop a play with [email protected] or phone (07) 3365-4913 by 20 April. Katharine Craik and the RSC called Marina, as well as seeing through the press a volume of essays edited with Tobias Döring on Shakespeare and CPD Certificates of Participation will be available. Thomas Mann. Fernie’s present critical project is a book entitled Shakespeare’s Freetown: Why the Plays Matter. But he also has a develop- LIght refreshments will follow the workshop. ing interest in the part played by Shakespeare in the nineteenth-century reformation of industrial Birmingham, and in particular in the work and life The Global Change Intitute is located on Staff House Road on of the radical preacher and lecturer George Dawson. the St Lucia campus..