361: Astrology and Shakespeare (with Kelly Downes)

Spirits: Mythology, Legends, & Folklore

Multitude

Myths, Folklore, Society & Culture, Alcohol, Legends, Learning, Urbanlegends, Mythology, Comedy, History, Education, Gods, Educational, Drunkhistory

4.8 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 8 November 2023

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Did you know that Shakespeare was really into astrology? We sure didn’t, which is why we’re joined by Kelly Downes, who gives us a great discussion to bookend our Supernatural Shakespeare series!

Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about or mentions of death, assassination, religious persecution, suicide, sex, fire, poisoning, war and battle.

Guest

Kelly Downes (she/her) is a theatre maker from Syracuse, NY, with strong ties to Boston, MA, currently living in Birmingham UK. She earned a BFA in Theatre & Performance from Emerson College, and a Masters in Shakespeare & Creativity from the Shakespeare Institute at University of Birmingham. Kelly is currently working to increase accessibility to arts and culture in Birmingham as a fundraiser at Midlands Arts Centre. She would love to connect with more like minded creatives on both sides of the Atlantic. If you are interested in queer Shakespeare; using storytelling to reconnect with the natural world; and devising new work inspired by classics, say hello!

Housekeeping

- Recommendation: This week, Julia recommends audiobooks! From Libby.

- Books: Check out our previous book recommendations, guests’ books, and more at https://spiritspodcast.com/books

- Call to Action: Check out Games and Feelings!

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Oh, Welcome to Spirit's
0:29.4	Spirit's Podcast, a Boozy dive into mythology, legends, and folklore.
0:33.0	Every week we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world.
0:36.4	I'm Amanda and I'm Julia.
0:38.2	And we're so excited to have a listener and expert,
0:41.2	dare I say, a new friend with us today.
0:43.0	Kelly Downs, welcome to the show!
0:45.0	Hello, thank you so much for having me.
0:47.4	It is our absolute pleasure and we are so excited to,
0:50.9	well our listeners know that we have been talking a lot about Shakespeare lately and the supernatural elements of Shakespeare in our supernatural Shakespeare series and Kelly we decided since we were wrapping up on that series know, I feel like we've hit all of the big ones at this point.
1:05.9	We wanted to talk to an expert about the supernatural elements that Shakespeare includes in his plays and then you reached out to us and we were like, well, this is perfect.
1:18.0	Amazing, yes, expert in one very niche area, I say but yeah I'm super excited.
1:25.7	Well why don't you tell us a little bit about that expertise in that very niche part of
1:29.6	Shakespeare's genre? I am a theater maker, mainly an actor and director, and I've always had an
1:37.6	affinity for Shakespeare. They're some of my favorite plays to work on as well as creating new work which is inspired by
1:44.7	Shakespeare and other classic texts. In 2019 I moved to the UK to pursue my master's
1:51.6	degree in Shakespeare and Creativity,
1:54.5	which was a program that blended creative
1:57.0	and academic approaches to Shakespeare's plays,
2:00.0	really interested in what those two approaches can teach each other and we got to work in partnership with
2:06.0	practitioners from the real Shakespeare company which was fantastic.
2:09.6	Whoa! I wrote my thesis on Shakespeare and astrology so the way that Shakespeare uses
	...

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