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BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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Word of Mouth

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Series exploring the world of words and the ways in which we use them

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Word of Mouth: How Shakespeare Spoke

26/01/2016

How Shakespeare Spoke

BBC Radio 4 - Word of Mouth, How Shakespeare Spoke

Michael Rosen and Dr Laura Wright discover how Shakespeare spoke.

How did Shakespeare speak? Michael Rosen and Dr Laura Wright are joined by linguist David Crystal and actor Ben Crystal to look at the fashion for original pronunciation.

Forget Laurence Olivier and Peggy Ashcroft, Al Pacino and Judi Dench. To take us back to Shakespeare's own time Michael Rosen and Dr Laura Wright hear Shakespeare as he himself would have spoken. The original, unvarnished version from linguist David Crystal and actor Ben Crystal. They look at the fashion for Original Pronunciation and ask what it can tell us about how we speak now.

Michael and Laura perform some of Shakespeare's best known work in the original accent and attempt to bring new meaning and wit to language coated by centuries of veneer.

Producer: Mair Bosworth.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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