4 April 2009

Short Beds for Shakespeare

Nash's House, Stratford-Upon-Avon
Nash House - a property owned by Shakespeare

According to vicious rumour, Shakespeare may not even have written his plays. Apparently, there are no draft copies of any of Shakespeare's work. Word has it that he was a canny businessman and outsourced the writing work to somebody else. There is, of course, no evidence that anyone else has written the plays either but it is an interesting concept. NotShakespeare.

Ken, Karina, Lauch and I went to visit NotShakespeare's birthplace and place of death in Stratford-Upon-Avon. In case you are like me and have wondered why the English name their towns -on-something, the Avon is the river that runs through Stratford. Therefore, Stratford-Upon-Avon.

We had cream tea (that is, scones with jam, clotted cream and a big pot of tea) and wandered through quiet streets full of fake reproduction Tudor buildings that Shakespeare and his various relatives have lived in. There is Shakespeare's birthplace, his wife's house, his daughter's house and his mother's house.

Street in Stratford-Upon-Avon
Reconstructed Tudor buildings in Stratford-Upon-Avon

Inside the house where Shakespeare was born is a very short bed with very large cushions. Why the short beds? In Shakespeare's time, people believed that they needed to sleep sitting up. Only dead people were laid out and that was how they let God take their soul. So just in case God thought you were dead and took your soul, you had to sleep sitting up all the time. I wonder if anyone ever slid sideways in their sleep.

Ken & Karina, Stratford-Upon-Avon
Ken and Karina

The prettiest house was Anne Hathaway's cottage, which has a thatched roof. It was a mile or so out of the town and across the road from it was a babbling brook surrounded by wild primroses and bluebells and little white flowers like stars with ducks that had shiny green feathers on their heads. It was straight out of an Enid Blyton book. After that we went to look at a castle that is 900 years old. Days like this I feel like I've found the real England. But not the real Shakespeare.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Glad you have found a little bit of the real England before you leave. Going out into the country is so beautiful and interesting. I hope you get to see a lot more before you leave.
love M . Love the photos and it is so nice to see your blog again.