Cullman Center Institute for Teachers, For Teachers: Shakespeare's Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice and Henry IV, part I

What’s so funny about Hamlet? Why is Falstaff tragic? What doesThe Merchant of Venice have to tell us about history? We will look at three of Shakespeare’s plays – a tragedy, a history, and a comedy – and examine how the playwright manipulates dramatic conventions. The course will take a dynamic approach: we will act out scenes, turn them upside down, and play them against the grain.

Andrew McConnell Stott teaches English at the University at Buffalo. A former stand-up comic, he is the author of Comedy and The Pantomime Life of Joseph Grimaldi: Laughter, Madness and the Story of Britain’s Greatest Comedian. He received a 2010 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching.