Melding tragedy, comedy, and romance into one, “The Winter’s Tale” is the story of a king mad with envy that escalates until the queen’s statue comes to life. The students take center stage, and it is their interpretation of the characters and their mastery of emotions that ultimately reveals the weight and nuance of forgiveness. 

In the St. Louis Black Repertory Company’s production of Carlyle Brown’s play The African Company Presents Richard III, William Shakespeare lingers like one of his own ghosts. He stands as […]

It’s Wednesday, April 22, and I’m sitting in my English major advisor’s Mallinckrodt office for my exit interview from the major. The interview, I’m told, is to help the department assess what’s working in the major, what isn’t and what it can do to better serve the next generation of Washington University’s literary scholars.

It’s registration time, and that means it’s a time of sadness as you watch your preferred classes’ seats fill up with upperclassmen before you get the chance to register. Now it’s time to rely on alternate plans and change your mind if that schedule isn’t looking so great anymore.

The Performing Arts Department production of the hilarious Shakespearean comedy “Twelfth Night” opens Thursday, April 17. Student Life recently sat down with the cast, featuring junior Kiki Milner as Viola, junior Anna Richards as Olivia and senior Will Jacobs as Malvolio, for a brief discussion on what we can expect from their production.

You may know Roland Emmerich as the director of explosion-heavy disaster movies “Independence Day” and “2012,” but this Friday he gives us “Anonymous,” a conspiracy-fed thriller that asks the question of whether or not Shakespeare actually wrote his plays.

For me, one of the enjoyable aspects of reading Shakespeare is interpreting his figurative language. In particular, the Bard’s employment of euphemisms, or substitutions of indirect expressions for unpleasant or embarrassing things, adds color to dialogue. For example, “what the dickens,” originates from “The Merry Wives of Windsor,” with Shakespeare replacing “devil” with “dickens.”