Off to Stratford on Avon

Street scene in Stratford

After a very mediocre lunch at The Smallest Pub in Bath we headed off for Shakespeare country a couple of hours drive through some lovely countryside.

Walk along R iver Avon

We found our B&B without too much trouble, which we had booked the night before, and had enough time left to meander round the town and along the river.  The weather was starting to get a bit grim and we experienced our first shower of rain.  Was a shame we didn't have time to go to the theatre where As You Like It was being performed.  Last time I was in Stratford was in 1998 and there have been many changes and improvements to the Shakespeare theatre since that time.  Even now it is under some more re-development.

Shakespeare's home

It is amazing how the house has been so well preserved in its almost original state all these years.

The works of Shakespeare of course are nothing less than incredible. His writings to me are like oil paintings, so rich in colour and description and full of passion. It is beyond belief that one person could write so much and so well.  Where did the inspiration come from?  Maybe we all have an untapped source of inspiration that Shakespeare somehow naturally drew on.



But be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve
greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.
Twelfth Night: or, What You Will, Act 2, Sc. 5

All the world's a stage,
     And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
     And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven stages.  At first  the infant,
     Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms;
Then the whining school boy, with his satchel
     And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwilling to school.  And then the lover,
     Sighing like furnace with a woeful ballard
Made to his mistress' eyebrow.  Then a soldier,
     Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,....
.......And then the justice....Full of wise saws and modern instances;
     And so he plays his part.  The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
     His youthful hose, well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shrank; and his big manly voice,
     Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
     That ends this strange evenful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
     Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing.
As You Like It, Act 2 Sc. 7