OTP 2021 Hub - Shakespeare Birthplace Trust
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust is delighted to be joining OUTing the past 2021 and this February marks our second year as a festival hub.
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust is the independent charity that cares for the world’s greatest Shakespeare heritage sites in his hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon and promotes the enjoyment and understanding of his works, life and times all over the world.
Although we still face challenges due to Covid restrictions, and sadly our sites remain closed, we are pleased to be able to present our live talk online and hopefully to an even larger audience.
Last year, we hosted our first OTP event at our Shakespeare Centre with a full day of wonderful speakers and performances. Dr Paul Edmondson, Head of Research at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, presented a talk on the bisexual voices of Shakespeare’s Sonnets and we were excited to share our first LGBT+ archival source guide, which we continue to expand.
For our presentation in February, we have taken inspiration from the poet Maya Angelou, one of the named writers in this year’s Outing the Past Festival. Speaking in 1985 to the National Assembly of Local Arts agencies, Angelou famously said of Shakespeare: ‘Of course, he was a black woman. I understood that. Nobody else understood it, but I know Shakespeare was a black woman. That is the role of art in life.’ Debra Ann Byrd (Artistic Director, The Harlem Shakespeare Festival) knows that Shakespeare was a black woman, too. She is the living embodiment of Angelou’s truth claim.
In 2017 Debra Ann Byrd was a writer-in-residence with The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, the University of Warwick and Misfit. She worked extensively on Othello in the archives cared for by the SBT, research which prompted her to write up her own memoir as a one-woman show: Becoming Othello: A Black Girl’s Journey.
The personal testimony of Debra Ann Becoming Othello: A Black Girl’s Journey and her work on Othello will take the form of a conversation between Debra Ann and Paul Edmondson, Head of Research, The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust and priest in The Church of England. Debra Ann will reflect on her powerful experiences of growing up in the States and finding her voice through her dramatic work and, especially, Shakespeare. She has performed the role of Othello several times and with an all-female cast.
This presentation adds to our understanding of the struggle of growing up as a black girl and woman, and finding a voice to articulate her experience through her theatrical work, especially Shakespeare.
This live presentation will form part of an online series of short talks on Wednesday 17 February 2021. You can find out more HERE
Our hope is that through working with our community and continued research of our rich collection, we can uncover stories, share ideas, and incite discussion about what connects us to LGBT+ history within Stratford upon Avon and Shakespeare’s works, life and time.