Shakespeare Week

c50 BC, Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, the last and most famous of the Ptolemaic dynasty. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

6 things you (probably) didn’t know about Cleopatra

Portrait of William Shakespeare by Dante Gabriel Rossetti. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

7 things you (probably) didn’t know about William Shakespeare

A painting by Vincenzo Camuccini depicting the death of Julius Caesar in the Roman Senate. (Photo by Leemage/Corbis via Getty Images)

The death of Caesar: do we know the whole story?

Droeshout Portrait. This engraving appeared as the First Folio frontispiece. (© Getty Images)

8 places that shaped the life of William Shakespeare

Battle Of Agincourt

Agincourt: what really happened

Portrait of Richard III, dated 15th century. (Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

Treachery at Bosworth: what really brought down Richard III

An illustration of a group of supposed witches being beaten in front of King James VI and I, c1610. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Shakespeare’s Macbeth and King James’s witch hunts

King John hunting on horseback, 14th century. The contention that his badness was a later invention simply doesn't stack up, argues Marc Morris. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Was King John really that bad?… Yes!

English actor Laurence Olivier as Richard III in a production of Shakespeare's play of the same name. (Photo by Felix Man/Picture Post/Getty Images)

Shakespeare’s best (or worst) villains

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Ira Aldridge: Shakespeare’s black Othello

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Shakespeare’s world and cricket in South Africa

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Have we completely misinterpreted Shakespeare’s Richard III?

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Shakespeare’s London: playing a dangerous game

Swan Theatre, Bankside, London, interior from drawing by Johannes de Witt. The Shakespearian theatre, erected c1593 on Bankside – could hold 3,000 spectators – typical of the time. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

At the playhouse: watching Shakespeare’s plays in Elizabethan England

Elizabeth I of England

Personal politics in Elizabeth I’s court