Shakespeare 400 – Stratford’s starring role

Confidentials 3 May 2016

SO, it’s 400 years since since Shakespeare’s death. At the time dying on your birthday must seem like a rough deal but it’s good for later publicity. We turned up at Stratford-on-Avon the weekend after the big celebration but this is a year-long party and a chance for the town to improve and update its already impressive range of Bardic offerings.

It can be a bit of a shock to see Julius Caesar consulting the Ides of March on his iPad

The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust manages the five very different properties relating to the playwright with a mission to reach out to all ages. Its website features videos and virtual tours to whet the appetite. In the town are the comfortable Tudor house where young Will grew up and Hall’s Croft, home to the surgeon, John Hall, and Shakespeare’s daughter, Susanna. High-ceilinged and furnished to show wealth, it has a magnificent formal garden with herbs that would have been used in Hall’s remedies. A telling detail on display was a letter from Sid, one of Hall’s patients, complaining of his dire distress and accusing Hall of lying when he claimed he was not available to see him. All the properties are marked by such personal touches.

As both houses have the original flagged floors it gave a frisson to know that we were literally walking in Shakespeare’s footsteps. Knowledgeable guides in costume loiter in rooms with intent to draw you into the experience of 16th century family life. In the Birthplace guest room a woman playing a harp explains about the mouldy oranges – bought for show and never intended to be eaten.

A costumed glover stands in John, the playwright’s father’s workshop amid an array of his wares, all designed for different purposes. In the window hang a range of “pockets” or Tudor man-bags, the must-have accessory for any Stratford dandy. We learn also about the less pleasant side of glove making – urine used as bleach and the noxious smell of human and animal waste from the tannery in the back yard.

The third town centre site (Nash’s House and New Place) is currently closed for a huge refurbishment in which the gardens are to be redesigned with specially commissioned modern sculptures. Below, its glorious Knot Garden.

Knot Garden at New Place

Country Matters

The two out of town properties with their land and gardens offer great family entertainment. Anne Hathaway’s Cottage at Shottery is beautifully preserved with the settle on which William and Anne did their courting and, again, a minor life-enhancing detail of a descendant who reputedly chipped splinters from it to sell for sixpence to tourists. Knowledgeable volunteers fill you in on period language and customs. You want to know the origins of upper crust? You’ve come to the right place.

Anne Hathaway's Cottage

The gardens are a delight, although we were too early for the sensory summer extravaganza of sweet peas and lavender. We did, however, take in a sonnet in the Sonnet Arbour, its trellises channelling the surround sound of the actor’s voice.

Mary Arden's Cottage – great for kids

Mary Arden’s Farmhouse (the home of Shakespeare’s mother) has been developed into a fascinating period attraction where costumed guides and volunteers cook Elizabethan feasts using authentic ingredients and care for the heritage animals and poultry without mod cons. We watched Kate the English longhorn cow being milked by hand into a wooden pail while her calf (Quickly) looked on.

Why “Quickly”? Because all the cattle must be called after Shakespeare characters and the names (rather like hurricanes) have to go through the alphabet. The calf may have had designs on being Viola or Titania but she ended up named after a brothel keeper.

You can also stroke the cute black Mangalitza pigs, learn to herd geese and groom Ellie the horse. The period feel is enhanced by groups of schoolchildren in costume, the only incongruous detail their trainer-clad feet.

But the highlight for us was found in the barn where the “Master” flies his birds. On our visit it was Talia, the eagle owl who has been with him for 28 years.

Owl man; below, mucking out the pigs

In a punitively hierarchical society, where every rank was assigned an appropriate bird of prey to hunt with, the poor peasant, who had most need of a large bird to catch enough food for his family, was allowed only a kestrel – beautiful but small and given to catching mice and blackbirds. Hardly much to fill the pot.

So the enterprising peasant would by-pass the law by catching and training an eagle owl since owls were not classified as official birds of prey. They also had the advantage of being camouflaged by their subtly blending plumage and of flying in absolute silence – bad news for the prey and also for anyone trying to catch the peasant at his poaching. I experienced this first hand as I crouched, eyes closed, while Talia flew just above my head. As the six-pound bird passed there was a slight down-draught but not a sound.

Avon Calling

Back in Stratford a visit to the beautiful Holy Trinity church on the banks of the Avon showed us Shakespeare’s grave with its famous curse:

Blessed be he who spares these stones

and cursed be he that moves my bones

although it is rumoured that a GPR (ground penetrating radar) has suggested the skull may, in fact, be missing.

The Bard

The Guild Church, more unassuming, is also worth a visit for the vestiges of Catholic murals. These were ordered to be wiped out in the reformation and John Shakespeare was given the task of doing this but chose just to whitewash over the paintings, perhaps in the hope of preserving them for prosperity. There are suggestions that John, and possibly William, were covert Catholics and certainly the Warwickshire area harboured many who clung to the old faith.

Guild church with the fragile remains of the murals

Stratford is of course on Avon and no visit would be complete without a boat trip, dodging swans, negotiating bridges and seeing the sights, both downriver (unparallelled view of Holy Trinity and the theatres) and upstream in pursuit of kingfishers and the idyllic back gardens of Tiddington Road, the most expensive street in Stratford. It offers a sneak peek into the balconied dressing rooms of the RST and, our guide informed us, it can be a bit of a shock to see Julius Caesar consulting the Ides of March on his iPad.

Horrible History

A very different slice of period life was delivered up in Tudor World. Set down a cobbled alley in the old Shrieve’s House, this is a hands-on fun experience for all the family. On the way in you are given a Tudor ID card with details of ‘your life’; on the way out you learn how you died – usually painfully and by execution. In between are chances to dress up, sit on the throne, pose in the stocks and glance in at some gruesome period practices. In one installation the barber surgeon extracts a patient’s tooth with no anaesthetic and much blood.

Plague tableau at Tudor World – cheesy but educational

In another the magician and alchemist, John Dee, sits surrounded by the paraphernalia of his trade. On the wall behind is the fascinating fact that he was a spy, code-named 007. And Ian Fleming took the moniker for what must mow be the most famous secret agent ever.

The Play’s the Thing

All this bardolatry (you can’t go far in this town without stumbling across quotations emblazoned on the pavement and statues contemplating skulls) would, of course, be pointless without the hub – the RST, the Swan and The Other Place. Stratford is about theatre and there is a host of exciting Shakespeare performances currently playing and lined up for the near future. Visit here for details. Sam Goodwin’s Hamlet with Paapa Essiedu in the title role, has had five star reviews and, if you don’t make it to Stratford, can be caught on live broadcast at cinemas around the country on June 8.

The RSC HQ dominates the River Avon

We took in Don Quixote at the Swan, the Elizabethan style theatre built on the site on the original Victorian structure. Its intimate performance space was ideally suited to the inventive ensemble playing that supported David Threlfall as the deluded knight and his slapstick sidekick, Sancho Panza (Rufus Hound). The piece was written by James Fenton in memory of its original author, Miguel Cervantes, who shares his 400th anniversary with the bard.

Cakes and Ale

It is difficult to go hungry in Stratford and the Cream Tea is a genteel ritual we couldn’t pass by – twice. Of the numerous teas on offer we would recommend the brasserie at The Arden Hotel on Waterside. In its spacious dining room overlooking the river we enjoyed delicate sandwiches, scones and fancies, including a moist and more-ish carrot cake. In the Church Street Townhouse we were again presented with a cake stand laden with goodies – more robust sandwiches this time and a very fine treacle tart among the cakes. For ale try the small craft beer bar, the Stratford Alehouse on Greenhill Street or The Bear on the banks of the Avon.

Stratford is well supplied with places to stay but we would recommend our hotel, The Stratford on Arden Street. Five minutes from the centre and with ample parking for £5 per day (a real asset in a small tourist town), this Q group hotel offers spacious, comfortable rooms, gym, conference rooms and very good food at a reasonable rate. Our pigeon breast starter and herb-crusted rump of lamb were excellent.

Out and About

The surrounding area has plenty of attractions. Three of the best are Kenilworth Castle and Garden – a vast, partly ruined pile dating from Norman times through to the Tudors with superb grounds where Robert, Earl of Dudley entertained Queen Elizabeth 1 (while there take in lunch at the superb Michelin starred pub, The Cross on New Street), Compton Verney Art Gallery and Park, currently hosting an exhibition of ‘Shakespeare in Art’ and Warwick Castle with its Knight’s Village, glamping in princess tents and numerous children’s activities.