Brighton (day 1)

Today we've travelled from London to Brighton, because starting tomorrow we'll be attending the IATEFL conference there. The train ride was blissfully uneventful. Brighton is a lovely city. We're staying in a hotel near the conference center, pretty much right on the beach. From our room we can see the water and the beach, so our view is amazing. We can totally see why it is such a popular tourist destination, especially in summer. Today the weather is great, so we got to sit in the sun for a bit as well. We bought some fish & chips and ate it on a bench at the beach. Pure bliss. We've also picked up our badges, so we don't have to stand in line tomorrow (we expect it to be way busier then!). Some photos to tell something about today in images: 

A nice little addition about yesterday. Sophie blogged about it already. One of the things our guide at the Shakespeare Globe kept telling us was how those visiting a Shakespeare play were called an audience and not spectators. That is because according to lore, the plays were especially to be heard. There were very few props. Maybe a backdrop and beautiful clothing, but that was about it. Everything was told (time of day, the weather, etc). He also made a very strong comparison. Reading Shakespeare is like reading a book about The Beatles. You don't give someone a book about The Beatles if you are talking about their music, you let them listen to it. The same goes for Shakespeare: it should be listened to. 

Another fun fact is that most likely not all of the Shakespeare texts are completely his. Actors only receive a part of the text (hence the word part for a role), so no-one had the complete text. Only a few of the plays were printed while Shakespeare was still alive. Most of them were printed after he died (like 7 years later if I remember correctly). They think that about 70% of each text is actually Shakespeare's. The other 30%  of each text is probably borrowed from contemporary writers. Mostly parts of the text where for instance there would have been a sword fight or something like that. Compare it to changing a screenplay into a book, it is conceivable that printers have done this, which would explain why sometimes a part of a text feels a bit different. A lot of Shakespeare's life is what we think it was like, the same goes for what the Globe looked like at the time. It is conjecture, based on facts. Interesting stuff.