Uploaded March 2022 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago

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Bruce R Smith, Leverhulme Visiting Professor, Newcastle University

Hosted by Professor Jenny Richards, Joseph Cowen Professor of English Literature

Famous for his words, Shakespeare is also a master creator of soundscapes. Anticipating the sound artists of today, Shakespeare turned the Globe and the Blackfriars theatres in London into acoustic environments full of music, the noises of fireworks, gunshots, and thunder – not to mention the applause, laughter, and shouts of his audiences. This lecture will position speech within this panoply of sounds.

Biography
Bruce R Smith, Dean’s Professor of English and Theatre at the University of Southern California, is the author of seven books on Shakespeare, including The Acoustic World of Early Modern England (1999), The Key of Green (2009), and Shakespeare | Cut (2016). He has chapters forthcoming in The Oxford History of the Book in Early Modern England (2021) and The Edinburgh Companion to Literature and Sound Studies (2023).

Live Q&A:
The lecture will be followed by a live Q&A with the speakers. You can submit a question during the event using YouTube Live Chat, via Twitter @InsightsNCL or by sending an email to public.lectures@ncl.ac.uk.

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