UCLA blog provides insider’s tour of Shakespeare’s England

For this year's participants in UCLA's annual summer Shakespeare program in England, the blog's the thing. For the first time in the program's vaunted 17-year history, the undergraduates are sharing their insights and experiences in London and Stratford-upon-Avon with the general public through UCLA's new " Bruins in Bardland " blog. From being a groundling in the audience of the famous Globe Theatre to clinking steins with the Royal Shakespeare Company at the players' favored pub, the Dirty Duck, the students' experiences will provide readers with an insider's tour of Shakespeare's England. "It's so inspiring to see the students' reaction to what may well be the finest Shakespeare productions in the world," said Jonathan Post, the UCLA English professor who launched the program in 1993. "Many of them have never seen live Shakespeare, and because students are able to use financial aid to take these classes, you'll get the perspective of young people who might never otherwise go to England." This year, the students will study five classic Shakespeare plays with Post, an authority on 17th-century lyric poetry, including the works of Shakespeare, and A.R. Braunmuller, a UCLA distinguished professor of English and one of the world's top Shakespeare experts. Students will also attend live productions of those plays featuring notable British stage actors and movie stars, including famed Shakespearean actor Simon Russell Beale and film stars Jude Law and Ethan Hawke. "The students are always astounded by how different it is to see the plays than to read them," said Braunmuller, who serves as the associate general editor of the New Cambridge Shakespeare and co-general editor of the New Pelican Shakespeare.