Reading List: Shakespeare Plays & Accompanying Materials

ShakespeareTheatreReading Lists
Written By Kathryn Barber

so far…

2024

      • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

      • 📺 Watch at The Globe

      • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Teaching Company Course

        • As You Like It

      • 📖  Read: “As You Like It,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

      • 📺 Watch: As You Like It (2006) — Kenneth Branaugh

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch the Globe’s version

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • Shakespearian Comedy

      • Malvolio in Love

    • Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Teaching Company Course

      • Appearance vs Reality in Twelfth Night

      • More Comic Tools

    • 📖  Read: “Twelfth Night,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📺Watch: Twelfth Night (2006) — (Helena Bonham Carter)

    • 📺Watch: She’s the Man (2006) — (modern adaptation)

    • 📺Watch: Twelfth Night (1980) — (BBC)

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • The Design of Tragedy

      • O Villiany!

      • The Noble Moor

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Teaching Company Course

      • Miscegenation and Mixed Messages

      • Monstrous Births

      • Ocular Proof

      • Tragic Knowledge

    • 📖 Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

      • Chapter 1: “1833: Miscegenation”

    • 📖  Read: “Othello,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📖 Read: “Model Minority” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 📺 Watch: Othello (1995) — Kenneth Branaugh

    • 📺 Watch: Othello (1965)

    • 📺 Watch: O (2001) — modern adaptation

    • Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • Getting Married in the 1590s

      • Farce and Romance

    • 📖  Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

      • Chapter 6: “1948: Marriage”

    • 📺 Watch: The Taming of the Shew (1967) — Elizabeth Taylor & Richard Burton

    • 📺 Watch: Kiss Me, Kate (1953) — film adaptation of broadway adaptation

    • 📺 Watch: *10 Things I Hate About You (*1999) — modern adaptation

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC Audible while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • Fair is Foul

      • Musing on Murder

      • Enter Two Murderers

    • 🎧 Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Audible Course

      • Foul and Fair

      • The Tragic Women in Macbeth

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Audible Course

      • Desire and Equivocation

      • Dispute it like a man

      • Bloody Babes and Bloody Ends

    • 📖  Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

      • Chapter 3: “1849: Class Warfare”

    • 📖  Read: “Macbeth,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📖 Read: “Tragedy and Interracial Poetry,” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 📺 Watch: Macbeth (1979) — Ian McKellan & Judi Dench

    • 📺 Watch: Macbeth (2015)

    • 📺 Watch: The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021) — Denzel Washington & Coen Brothers

    • 📺 Watch: Macbeth (2006) — contemporary retelling

    • BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • The Abundance of the Play

      • The Protestant Hero

    • 🎧 Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Audible Course

      • Staging Hamlet

      • The Religious Drama of Hamlet

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Audible Course

      • Stand and Unfold Yourself

      • The Performance of Revenge

      • Difficult Women

      • Uncontainable Hamlet

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • Action in Hamlet

    • 📖  Read: “Hamlet” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • Watch: Hamlet (1990) — Helena Bonham Carter, Glenn Close, & Mel Gibson

    • 📺 Watch: Hamlet (1996) — Kenneth Branaugh

    • 🎧 BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Audible Course

      • Comic Tools

      • Comic Structure

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • The Multiple Actions in Midsummer Night’s Dream

    • 📖  Read: “Midsummer Night’s Dream” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📺 Watch: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1991) — Michelle Pfeiffer & Stanley Tucci

    • 📺 Watch: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2022)

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 📖 Read: “Staging Hate,” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 🎧  Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Teaching Company Course

      • The Arc of Character in The Merchant of Venice

    • 🎧  Listen to William Shakespeare: Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies Teaching Company Course

      • Courting the Heiress

      • Shylock

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Teaching Company Course

      • Love and Artifice in Love’s Labor’s Lost and Much Ado About Nothing

    • 📖 Read: “Anti-Black Comedy” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 📺 Watch: Much Ado About Nothing (1984)

    • 📺 Watch: Much Ado About Nothing (1993) — Kenneth Branaugh

    • 🎧 Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • Sex in Society

      • Justice and Comedy

    • 📖  Read: “Measure for Measure” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 🎧 Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Teaching Company Course

      • Measure for Measure—Is This Comedy?

    • 📺 Watch: Measure for Measure (2006) — retelling set in British army

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺  Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • Tools of Romance in The Tempest

      • Shakespeare’s Farewell to Art

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • Three Kinds of Tempest

    • 📖 Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

      • Chapter 5: “1916: Immigration”

    • 📖  Read: “The Tempest” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📖 Read: “Shakespeare’s White Settler,” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 📺 Watch: The Tempest (2010) — Helen Mirren

    • 📺 Watch: The Tempest (2010) — Christopher Plummer

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Audible Course

      • Epic Desires

      • Identity Politics

      • The Art of Dying

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • Change in Anthony and Cleopatra

    • 📖  Read: “Anthony and Cleopatra” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📖 Read: “Mythologising the Tawny Queen,” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

    • 📺 Watch: Antony and Cleopatra (2015) — Stratford Festival

    • 📺 Watch: Cleopatra (1963)

2025

    • 🎧 Listen to performance while reading original text

    • 📺  Watch: “Henry VIII,” Royal Shakespeare Company

    • 📖 Read: “Anne Boleyn” by William Breneton

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺  Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • Shakespearean Tragedy

      • Public Violence and Private Bliss

    • 🎧 Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Teaching Company Course

      • Words, Words, Words

      • The Tools of Tragedy

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • History and Henry VIII

    • 📖 Read: “Romeo and Juliet,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 📖 Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

    • 📺 Watch: Romeo + Juliet(1996)

    • 📺 Watch: West Side Story (1961)

    • 📺 Watch: Romeo & Juliet (2013)

    • 📺 Watch: Romeo and Juliet (2014, Broadway)

    • 📺Watch: Rosaline (2022)

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Teaching Company Course

      • The Loner and the Mob

      • The Theatre of Politics

      • Mothers and Killers

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Teaching Company Course

      • Coriolanus: The Hero Alone

    • 📺 Watch: Coriolanus – Royal Shakespeare Company

currently…

2026

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC Audible while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧  Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • The Theory of Kingship

      • The Fall of the King

    • 🎧  Listen to How to Read and Understand Shakespeare Teaching Company Course

      • History and Kingship

    • 📖  Read: “Richard II,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC Audible while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • All the King’s Men

      • The Life of Falstaff

    • 🎧 Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Audible Course

      • History and Family in Henry IV’

    • 📖 Read “1 Henry IV,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 🎧  Listen to BBC Audible while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • Henry IV Part 2: Contrast and Complexity

    • 🎧  Listen to BBC performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧  Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • This Is the Worst

      • Wisdom Through Suffering

      • Then We Go On

    • 🎧  Listen to Shakespeare’s Tragedies Audible Course

      • Kingship and Kinship

      • Unaccommodated Man

      • The Stage of Fools

      • Is this the promised end?

    • 📖  Read: “King Lear,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

    • 🎧 Listen to performance while reading text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • The Death of Falstaff

      • The King Victorious

    • 🎧 Listen to BBC Audible while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧  Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Audible Course

      • The Matter of Rome

      • Heroes of History

    • 📖 Read Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

      • Chapter 4: “1865: Assassination”

      • Conclusion: “2017: Left Right”

    • 📖 This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith: Julius Caesar

    • 🎧 Listen to performance while reading original text

    • 🎧 Listen to performance while reading original text

    • 🎧 Listen to performance while reading original text

    • 🎧  Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧  Listen to Shakespeare: The Word and the Action Teaching Company Course

      • Nature and Art in The Winter’s Tale

    • 📖  Read: “The Winter’s Tale,” This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

up next…

2027

  • 🎧 Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 🎧 Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 🎧 Listen to William Shakespeare: Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories Teaching Company Course

      • Ancient Epic in a New Mode

      • Heroic Aspirations

  • 🎧 Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 🎧 Listen to audio performance while reading original text

    • 📺 Watch at The Globe

    • 📖 Read: “Barbarous Spectacle,” The Great White Bard by Farah Karim-Cooper

Great Teaching Company Courses

  • How to Read and Understand Shakespeare by Marc C. Conner

  • Shakespeare’s Tragedies by Clare R Kinney

  • William Shakespeare: Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies by Peter Saccio

  • Shakespeare: The Word and the Action by Peter Saccio

Accompanying Texts

  • This Is Shakespeare by Emma Smith

  • Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro

  • The Great White Bard: How to Love Shakespeare While Talking About Race by Farah Karim-Cooper

Kathryn Barber
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