All the world's a stage!!

After spending almost the whole of Saturday sick in bed (shocking - I hate staying in bed, but every time I got up I felt too dizzy... so back to bed it was!) I decided to waste another day in London Town would be sinful. I dragged myself out of bed about 11.30am and after getting organised for the day I hopped on the train to London Bridge. I walked along South Bank, the river Thames today which was really nice. It was such a beautiful day for it too - the sun was shining and the sky an amazing blue. This is a nice change from what I first arrived in London to! There are loads of great pubs with seating outside... many places I'd like to come to with friends and spend an afternoon!

St. Paul's Cathedral in the background, and me standing on the River Thames :)

I didn't have any real plans, I just walked around having a look at whatever I was walking past. Sometimes that is the best way. What did I spy - but Shakepeare's Globe Theatre. Gosh. I could hardly keep walking and not bother venturing in. I am actually planning to go and see a play with Fran and David in early July, but I read the information sign out the front that described the 'exhibition and tour' and decided it would be well worth it to have a better understanding of the theatre itself and how it works. I paid my £11.50 which included the exhibition and guided tour, and went inside. 

This was at the door to the exhibition, repeated three times: love it!

The Globe from the outside

And from the inside :)

"All the world's a stage" - As You Like It.

The exhibition was really very good. Quite informative with some great artefacts. Some really old childs shoes (alright, alright, I have a shoe obsession.... so shoot me!) that were excavated from the original Globe Theatre site, which as I learnt today is not where it currently is! Where it is now, is 300m closer to the river. Apparently the location now used to be a rubbish dump back in the day. Where the original Globe Theatre was, they built some other buildings on. Random fact of the day! The lady who ran the guided tour was excellent. She was a real story teller and told us all sorts of stories about the times of Shakespeare, but allowed time for questions as well. I didn't know that the Globe burnt to the ground in 1613 due to a canon being let off at the start of Henry VIII - they miscalculated where the canon would go to, and it set the thatched roof on fire. Oops. Nobody was hurt, but apparently one man complained his leg got a little burnt but luckily his friend poured some ale on it to stop his trousers burning. They rebuilt the Globe it with a tiled roof in 1614.  It was pulled down in 1644 by a bunch of Protestants, who at the time were pulling down theatres all over London. Sad. 

Playing silly buggers with the hands-on artefacts. Luckily nobody else was around to witness this haha! Oh wait... except those people in the photo! *GASP!*

So, what stands on the South Bank now is not the original, but a replica of it. It has a thatched roof again, just like the original. That is pretty cool, because it is the first (and at this stage the only) thatched roof allowed in London since the great fire in 1666. The replica finally opened in 1997 after six years of construction. I hadn't realised that at all, so I certainly learnt many new things today. In fact I have learnt TONNES of things since living here. It really is a great way to learn. It is so much more interesting when you are immersed in it! These days the theatre holds 1500 audience members. 500 standing in front of the stage (which evidently is the best place to stand...) although back in the day they crammed 3000 people in there! Tickets back in the day were just 1p, and today are £5 for standing which apparently is the 1p equivalent of Shakespeare's day! They use natural lighting, there are no lighting bars on the stage at all.  There are some lights which mimic daylight which they turn on in the evening only to allow enough light to be seen. They keep the stage to a bare minimum - they don't use huge sets and props that fly in and out - just subtleties that help set the scene, e.g. they might scatter leaves on the stage to help you visualise that the scene is set in a forest. 

I really liked this. And I learnt that so many commonly used phrases were written by Shakespeare. See if you can see any you use that were written by him!

The people who stood in front of the stage were known as "Penny Stinkards" because they paid just 1p to be there, and because of the stench... they didn't want to leave the place they were standing so would relieve themselves where they were... I can only but imagine how disgusting it would have smelt. People were standing with no elbow room - but back then 'personal bubbles' had not been invented. I would never have coped haha! People sitting up on the seats would bring an orange with them to eat during the performance, and as they peeled it would rub it on their skin to counteract the stench coming from below. Interesting. But it makes perfect sense!

All in all, I learnt a LOT about Shakespeare and the history of the Globe Theatre today... and it was all spur of the moment! That is a bonus of traveling alone I suppose... no direct plans, walking along, see something you like, and BAM - yeah - I will do that today! I also now have a much better understanding of how Shakespeare's plays work... Shakespeare himself once said; "Come and hear a play", whereas nowadays we would say "Come and see a play"... I learnt today that being the stage is sparse, you really must listen as he tells you everything you need to know to piece together a story. You are there to be entertained aurally as much as visually :) I am now looking forward to seeing a play there in July!!

Another week starts tomorrow, two weeks until the holidays. And then only a few days until I venture off to Turkey! 

Until next time something interesting happens, 

Cheery Bye :)