Society celebrates Shakespeare
WESTCLIFF - Love them or hate them, the works of William Shakespeare have been part of the cultural experience of South Africans for many years.
The Shakespeare Society of Southern Africa is a group of people who celebrate, value and promote the bard’s works in Johannesburg and further afield.
Eleanor-Mary Cadell of the society’s Johannesburg branch said Shakespeare’s works had “generated a substantial heritage of interest” among South Africans.
“This is scarcely surprising, since Shakespeare is established as a valued, if sometimes controversial feature of education at secondary and tertiary levels, and holds his own in the performance repertoire of South African theatre, ballet and classical music,” she said.
The society’s origins lay in a discussion that followed an address by the late Prof. Muriel Bradbrook, professor emerita of the University of Cambridge, during the winter school at the 1984 National Arts Festival in Grahamstown.
“Johannesburg [based] journalist, Joe Podbury, suggested the formation of a national body to foster the interest in Shakespeare already felt by many ordinary South Africans,” she said.
“A steering committee was accordingly elected. The inaugural meeting of the society took place a year later, on 5 July, in the 1820 Settlers National Monument in Grahamstown.”
At that meeting, a draft constitution was amended and adopted, and the late Prof. Guy Butler was elected president unopposed, together with an executive committee.
The society aims to encourage and stimulate the appreciation of Shakespeare’s works, particularly in southern Africa, and to enrich the study of Shakespeare in schools, technikons, training colleges and universities.
“[We also] aim to stimulate interest in Shakespeare among the general public by means of productions, readings, lectures, courses, seminars and conferences, and to publish and distribute appropriate literature on Shakespeare,” said Cadell.
The Johannesburg branch’s next meeting will feature a screening of the BBC production of Measure for Measure.
The meeting will take place on 18 May at Nupen Centre, The Ridge School, Woolston Road, Westcliff, at 5pm.
There will be a nominal cover charge, and attendees are encouraged to dress warmly.
Details: 011 788 4251; https://www.ru.ac.za/static/institutes/shake/
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