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Shakespeare's Restless World

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Shakespeare's Restless World: 20. Shakespeare Goes Global

Shakespeare Goes Global

20. Shakespeare Goes Global

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Shakespeare's Restless World, 20. Shakespeare Goes Global

How a folio of collected plays in 1623 began the creation of a global phenomenon.

From first folio to the 'Robben Island Bible', Neil MacGregor shows how Shakespeare became a global phenomenon. From May 2012.

The publication of the First Folio of Shakespeare's collected plays in 1623 began the process of turning an early modern playwright into a global phenomenon. 

An annotated copy of the Collected Works of Shakespeare reveals the extent to which Shakespeare has inspired and influenced audiences across the globe and through the ages.

Object-based history series presented by Neil MacGregor, former Director of the British Museum.

Taking artefacts from William Shakespeare's time, he explores how Elizabethan and Jacobean playgoers made sense of the unstable and rapidly changing world in which they lived.

With old certainties shifting around them, in a time of political and religious unrest and economic expansion, Neil asks what the plays would have meant to the public when they were first performed.

He uses carefully selected objects to explore the great issues of the day that preoccupied the public and helped shape the works, and he considers what they can reveal about the concerns and beliefs of Shakespearean England.

Producer: Paul Kobrak

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in May 2012.

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Factual: History

Neil MacGregor uncovers the stories 20 objects tell us about Shakespeare's world.

Making a selection of objects from the British Museum and collections across the UK, Neil MacGregor uncovers the stories they tell about Shakespeare's world.

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