"Holla" actually appears in many Shakespeare plays -- don't tell me this guy wasn't ahead of his time! The title reference is from Hamlet -- the best part of teaching that play...just ahead of the moment when it dawns on someone that "Hey! This is the story of 'The Lion King'!" Ah, Disney -- where would we be without you?
So it’s time to get real, people. Enough of the swanning about, taking fun pictures & writing blithely pithy little missives. The temperature is up, the routine is down, and we’re here to work. Toil. Labour. Put our studious noses to Henry Clay Folger’s mighty grindstone.
OK, it’s still really, really fun. I was just trying to set a tone. I’m also including at least one picture, and here it is: it’s our schedule, specifically last week’s schedule, but the basic routine is the same each week. For those who’ve been itching for some nuts & bolts, here they are.
Each morning, at 7:45, those of us staying at American hop on our yellow school bus (you remember Albert, our driver, from a few posts ago), for the ride down to Capitol Hill; it’s a lovely ride, taking us by Rock Creek Park, along the Potomac, and then all around the Capitol to the back of it, where the Library sits, kitty-corner from the Supreme Court (Dan asked me if I’ve seen Elena Kagan in there, measuring for new drapes…not yet, is the answer). At the library, we are greeted most enthusiastically by our fellow TSIers who are not staying in the dorms, along with our wonderful camp counselors: Folger staff, scholars, performance & curriculum masters. It’s very jaunty.
As you may be able to see, I made note of the crucial 8:45-9:00 am event: coffee.
From 9-10 for 3 mornings each week, then, we are treated to AMAZING lectures by our scholars: Jay Halio, emeritus professor from the University of Delaware, Margaret Maurer from Colgate, and Stephen Dickey from UCLA. Each delivers a lecture on the play of the week, which the first week was 1H4, or Henry IV, Part One, for you laypeople out there; after that, 12th Night, Measure for Measure, & we’ll finish with Mackers. After each lecture, the scholar takes questions informally, before we break into our official seminar groups, in which we all go off with one of those same scholars for a (somewhat) more structured discussion of the lecture, the play more generally, and just about any other aspect of anything Shakespeare ever wrote or thought about writing, because these folks Know Their Stuff. It’s rather awe-inspiring.
We have lunch from 11:30-12:30, and about 4 days out of 5, there’s something happening during lunch, a talk or a demonstration or something like that, including sometimes having a guest lecturer who joins us. For instance (and this is going to be particularly juicy for my teacher chums), last Friday, the lecture was by Barbara Mowat, co-editor of the entire Folger Shakespeare Library. As in (look in the bottom right corner – that’s where her name appears on every single play in the Folger editions!) …
This is her, counseling my TSI colleague Randall; she’s the warmest, most soft-spoken person, and she speaks of Shakespeare from the deepest place in her heart – to the point that she told us that there were some years in her professorial career in which she could not teach King Lear, it moved her so.
I must confess the following: the Folger (maybe obviously) is a non-circulating library, so there are empty shelves around the Reading Room where scholars in residence can store the books they’re using, so they don’t get re-shelved. And I took a picture of Barbara Mowat’s shelf! Here it is! Folger-ites reading this, please don’t narc me out – I’m really not stalking her! I just couldn’t resist, especially since it was right below my own shelf (yes! you read that right!) I presently have a little Dymo labeled shelf of my very own in the Folger Library Reading Room! Don’t believe me? Let the iPhone tell the story – here’s me & Barbara, just one floor apart, at least until July 23:
In case you’re wondering, on Barbara’s shelf is old stalwart Fowler’s Modern English Usage – some things never go out of style.
OK, so that takes us to lunch – and it only took me 4 days to write this. Crikey! I’ll post this now, so I can hold my head up in the imaginary Blog Republic of my mind, and try to get busy with what the rest of our days typically look like + some highlights of other events along the way.
Cheers,
Gingy
