Really Good Advice!
Never do Shakespeare's Hamlet in a Brummy accent!

One of the guys here has been taking the piss out of our boss by doing just that. It just sounds wrong!

Pop. First post, be gentle with me.
(Herr Doktor Lemminge Is bored, so cheer me up!, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:38, 13 replies)

But
wasn't Shakespeare from Stratford way? Surely that's close enough for him to sound like a Brummie?

So that's how it would have sounded originally.

*demonstrates ignorance of English regional accents, and history*
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:40, closed)

I had never
though of that before.

Good point.

Does anyone know how Shakespeare would have sounded when performed originally?

*looks at Enzyme and awaits clever response*
( Bazongaloid, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:42, closed)

I think at the time
the law said that immediately upon passing through the gates of ye olde London towne, thou shalt start speaking like Welshman, Richard Burton or French sounding gentleman, Monsieur Laurence Olivier.
(bazmorningstar efil4nat3b, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:42, closed)

more importantly
was it a yam yam or yow yow brummie accent?
(Halfy By light alone, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:43, closed)

@al
Remember that English as it was spoken at the time was much more colloquial than that spoken now - I believe that Shakespearean English would've sounded somewhat more West Country than RP, though obviously there'd've been regional variations.

Nothing like the cut-glass of, say, the Queen's speeches.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:45, closed)

@Halfy Does it make a difference
Yow yow brummy, but they all sound bad. And that's from a Scotsman!
(Herr Doktor Lemminge Is bored, so cheer me up!, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:48, closed)

@Enzyme
"Remember that English as it was spoken at the time was much more colloquial than that spoken now"

Have you ever been to Dundee, Enzyme? :-)
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:51, closed)

@K2k6
Indeed I have. What I meant was that the English of the educated and wealthy wasn't so different from that of the commoner. Thus Queen Bess to Edward de Vere when he returned to court: "Sir, I had quite forgot the fart". (He'd let rip in her presence, and was so mortified that he'd put himself into exile.)
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:55, closed)

@k2k6
Come on now, Dundonian isn't that bad, I've spoken it all my life.
(Herr Doktor Lemminge Is bored, so cheer me up!, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:56, closed)

@Enzyme
Ah, I see what you mean now.

*chuckles at fart reference*
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 12:58, closed)

I think I read somewhere
that Elizabethan English was quite similar to a modern Australian accent.

Although there is always the danger that I dreamt it...
(moglin shall make you writhe in her cage of torment on, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 13:15, closed)

Don't forget...
...that the Elizabethan theatre was an extremely low-brow affair, plays being aired alongside bear-baiting etc. Both theatre attendance and acting were viewed as distinctly down market, with aristocrats who loved watching plays sometimes attending in disguise to protect their reputations - the actors would most certainly not have spoken in RP.

Whilst Shakespeare was reputedly from Stratford, his actors were unlikely to have been, seeing as the theatres in which they were shown were all in and around Shoreditch, Lahndahn - so the likelihood of cockernee actors is quite high. "Is this a fackin' dagger I see before me?"

*capers off with a riddle-me-ree and a hey-nonny-no and an unfunny pun about the Earl of Gloucester's stockings*
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 13:55, closed)

"Ter boi orr not ter boi?"
*click*
(Axeman Jim, Tue 24 Jun 2008, 16:58, closed)