This Sceptred Isle: Shakespeare and the Plantagenets


Nice little exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery using their portraits to focus on the Plantagenet plays of William Shakespeare.

Although most of the pictures weren’t contemporary ones but later representations the commentaries were excellent and pointed out themes in the plays I’d not thought about before. It showed how they were commentaries on the politics of the times they were written in as well as being histories. They reflect the uncertainty of who would succeed Elizabeth and examined the nature of kingship.

There was a good timeline of the Plantagenet kings alongside another of the plays. I’d not realised that the Wars of the Rose set of plays was written before the chronologically earlier set.

Closes on 10 December 2019


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