Tag Archives: shakespeare

Plotting Paradise: A journey through medieval maps and the mind

Posted on August 27, 2015 by samiraahmed

  Strains of Paradise may start with medieval maps and the Garden of Eden, but producer Anthony Denselow and I didn’t want to shy away from difficult questions too.  So we ask a Muslim theologian about the power of a … Continue reading →

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Shylock: A Traveller in Time

Posted on May 12, 2015 by samiraahmed

The film producer Davina Belling once said of Jonathan Pryce that she always uses him as a lesson for actors “not to count their lines when they’re offered a role. He had 20 lines in the whole film [Breaking Glass] … Continue reading →

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Hero or love rat? Jane Austen and procrastination

Posted on July 17, 2013 by samiraahmed

I made a Something Understood about Procrastination, focused on heroes. From the world of statecraft we have JFK’s use of delay to avert World War III in the Cuban Missile  Crisis, and in contrast Dr Martin Luther King challenging the … Continue reading →

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In Hulme: a stately Hippodrome decree’d

Posted on July 1, 2012 by samiraahmed

There is a grand Victorian theatre house where Laurel and Hardy once performed, Nina Simone sang and the Beatles made their first radio recording. If it were in Stratford-Upon-Avon or central London, the rich paintwork and red plush seats and … Continue reading →

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Thor: Tales from Shakespeare (and Johnny Utah)

Posted on May 11, 2011 by samiraahmed

While there’s been much surprise at the choice of Kenneth Branagh to direct Marvel Studios’ action film Thor, there’s plenty of evidence that he was an inspired choice. This is my post today for The Spectator Arts Blog. Thanks to … Continue reading →

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Whose Bible is it anyway? A discussion on the King James version

Posted on March 21, 2011 by samiraahmed

After all the celebrations for the poetry and power of the King James Version, I chaired a rather more revisionist public panel discussion for the Royal Shakespeare Company on March 9th. In the atmospheric setting of the Stationers’ Hall, off Ludgate … Continue reading →

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