portraits of shakespeare

Why would that be? And probably the first actor, who both painted it and owned it, was a very promising up and coming actor trained by Shakespeare, Joseph Taylor, who is on record as having been both a player and a painter, and almost certainly, in some quiet afternoon, probably not even a whole day, did this oil painting of the great Shakespeare. Shakespeare is one of the subjects, using the Cobbe portrait of 1610, in which Shakespeare, is splendidly dressed in aristocratic clothes, like the wealthy man he was by 1610. DUNCAN-JONES: And it’s possibly not a particularly good likeness. SHEIR: Let’s turn now to the third portrait you talk about in the book. There’s a tremendous assortment of ancient, and not quite so ancient, and more or less contemporary figures among the 206, is it, images. He was only 24, he wasn’t yet in any way a man of substance or wealth, though he may have already been either considering joining an acting company or might already have joined one, to bring money into the family. Garland Scott is the associate producer. They had patrons, who would look after them financially and encourage them in some cases to write a particular kind of poem or a particular kind of work. There’s just one women; that is the poet Sappho. And this didn’t leave him with very much time for sitting for his portrait. Duncan-Jones provides a detailed critique of three of the most widely accepted portraits: the engraving facing the First Folio’s title page; the sculptured stone bust that adorns Shakespeare’s funerary monument at Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon; and the “Chandos portrait,” an early seventeenth-century painting on canvas which is widely recognized as the best image. Figure 7: The portraits overlaid, with Elizabeth at 25% opacity and Shakespeare at 75%. SHEIR: Well, Katherine Duncan-Jones, thank you so much. Although it had been obscure and in private hands since the seventeenth century, it came with a continuous provenance which further investigation has supported. “Now Thy Image Doth Appear” was produced by Richard Paul. Portrait owned by the Cobbe family, painted in 1610, is now claimed to be the most accurate likeness. I mean, there’s plenty of evidence that that was very widely read. Her book, Portraits of Shakespeare, was published by Oxford's Bodleian Library in 2015. Dr. Yes, perhaps this sums it up. This is the Chandos portrait. This signed and dated engraving by Martin Droeshout (1601- after 1639) is the frontispiece to the First Folio of Shakespeare's works, published in 1623. The Chandos portrait, Duncan-Jones informs us, is a poor name for the best portrait we have of Shakespeare. SHEIR: You do a really nice job in your book of discussing how, if we look at the stories behind portraits of other writers, we could get an idea as to why there aren’t more Shakespeare portraits. It is supposed to be an engraving from the Chandos portrait of Shakespeare, and is engraved by G. Vertue. This is the only portrait of Shakespeare that has a good claim to have been painted from life, and may be by a painter called John Taylor who was an important member of the Painter-Stainers' Company. There are only two commonly accepted portraits of William Shakespeare, both of which are posthumous.One is the engraving that appears on the cover of the First Folio (1623) and the other is the sculpture that adorns his memorial in Stratford upon Avon, which dates from before 1623.However, several paintings from the period have also been argued to represent him. SHEIR: You do some great detective work in the book because the date given for Shakespeare’s birth is April 23, that’s St. George’s Day, but you write that wasn’t adopted as his official birthday until the 18th century. The portrait shows Shakespeare sitting on an elaborately carved chair, holding a book in his left hand and resting his right hand on the head of a dog, which is sitting to his right. Folger Shakespeare Library. The right eye is looking directly at the artist, and the left eye is pointed off to Shakespeare's left. It’s very hard to know who in 1588 would have painted Shakespeare’s portrait. How do we know that it’s probably real? 201 East Capitol Street, SE Washington, DC 20003, Main (202) 544-4600Box Office (202) 544-7077. I mean, he said it “was for gentle Shakespeare cut,” which almost implies, "this is meant to be Shakespeare, but I’m not sure that it is.". I’m not sure who would have paid for that during Shakespeare’s lifetime. The Cobbe portrait will be at the centre of an exhibition trying to unravel the intrigue that will open at The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-on-Avon on 23 April. What everyone is looking for in Shakespeare. But it is striking that all of Shakespeare’s patrons do appear to have been male. SHEIR: Katherine, is there some motivation to fake an image of Shakespeare or to claim that an image is of Shakespeare? Careful examination of the image has determined the breed of the dog, which appears to be a Lurcher, a cross between a Greyhound and a working dog. SHEIR: You talk in your book about this kind of Mount Rushmore of writers and great thinkers at the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and Shakespeare is not there. William Shakespeare Portrait. Portraits of Shakespeare. It’s so intriguing that, as you say in the book, portrait engravings are almost always based on some picture, but we have no idea what this one is based on. But nobody has actually found a John who seems to be the right kind of age, in the right kind of place, to have created this very attractive and lively, though slightly rough, painting. Browse our full list of Shakespeare Unlimited episodes. SHEIR: The second portrait you talk about in the book is this engraving. And he lived in two places, London and Stratford, and journeys between those two places probably took two to three days every time he made them, sometimes longer than that. Check your inbox or spam folder now to confirm your subscription. And then, eventually, the white was taken off, and it was recolored, and with that huge, long gap, people didn’t really know exactly what the coloring and the detail was like. I don’t myself think that it is of Shakespeare. An introduction to English literature (1902) (14761062551).jpg … So it’s safe to say, you imagine that you have a pretty good idea of what Shakespeare looked like. It’s not a very charming picture. Also, the young man portrayed is wearing a very, very grand lace collar of a kind that would normally be worn by, I would think, very few young men below the rank of nobleman, and Shakespeare certainly wasn’t a nobleman. You can find more about the Folger at our website, folger.edu. Her book, full list of Shakespeare Unlimited episodes. And it has been thought to be possibly authentic, because there’s a bit of paper attached to the back of the wood panel, painting on a wood panel, which gives the birth and death dates and the right age for Shakespeare. Yes, I mean he just hadn’t made it, no. Every few years a ‘new’ portrait of Shakespeare is discovered. But I don’t think we can trust that bust for all sorts of reasons, but the chief reason is that it needed restoration after barely 20 years. DUNCAN-JONES: Well, they had the leisure that their husbands didn’t have. I mean, I suppose they could be based on another engraving, but that sounds unlikely in this case. Engraving by William Holl. It’s just a portrait, which for a period of time was believed to be authentic. But it does appear that the label was written and attached to the back of the painting at a considerably later date. Become a teacher member to get access to lesson plans and professional development. One is that... well, two, the two main reasons why I don’t think it’s of Shakespeare: It’s a very grand painting and will have required expensive work by a fully trained and practiced limner. It was published under his name. Katherine was interviewed by Rebecca Sheir. But, all-in-all, pretty good. They were almost exactly the same age. The engraved portrait of Shakespeare, on the title page of the first publication of his works, shows distinct similarities when compared to this painting. It doesn’t look very much like the other images, the three that we’ve already looked at. Here is some information about the most important: 1) Chandos Portrait. Unfortunately, there were several with the surname Droeshout and the initial M. And the jury is still, I think, out, not absolutely certain on which member of the Droeshout family actually should be credited with the First Folio engraving. He was very prolific and he cultivated wealthy patrons, and that was how a great many of the successful Elizabethan and Jacobean writers made their money. … MICHAEL WITMORE: From the Folger Shakespeare Library, this is Shakespeare Unlimited. Lindsay, 1885 (OCoLC)807005230: Named Person: William Shakespeare; William Shakespeare: Document Type: Book: All Authors / Contributors: Joseph Parker Norris. Of the countless editions of the works of Shakespeare that show a frontispiece likeness of the poet, it is a singular fact that by far the greater number favour the 'Chandos' portrait. In the book, you make it sound like it’s not very attractive? So it’s a mistake, rather than a fake. Indeed, it is far more like the pictures of James I than the Chandos portrait of Shakespeare. I would have liked to have seen a discussion of the Ashbourne portrait, the Janssen portrait, and the "The Chess Players." This was the breakthrough that I feel I made about a year ago... That perhaps it wasn’t John, perhaps it was a Joseph Taylor and was the rather well-documented young actor Joseph Taylor. KATHERINE DUNCAN-JONES: Well, being "of Shakespeare," of course, is itself problematic. In 2006, while attending an … Personality there and a presence think that it is, alas, a 19th-century creation professor Katherine duncan-jones is emerita. You imagine that you have a pretty good idea of what Shakespeare looked like, but it Appear. Emerita of English at University College, London same way relationships with,... Of English at University College, London these images came to be an,. Going while he was writing they lived only about 25 miles apart from each other as.! 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