On 23 April 2014, the 450th anniversary of Shakespeare’s birth, a production of Hamlet set off from the Globe Theatre in London. In a span of two years, the 16-person acting group is touring every country in the world, visiting seven continents in 732 days. People around the world will be able to enjoy these celebratory performances, as they have for hundreds of years.
Even mere decades after Shakespeare’s works were published in London, they had circulated from the west coast of Africa to New York City. Only a century or two after that, his plays had reached places like Japan, China, Italy, and Argentina. Now, there are many replicas of Shakespeare’s Globe theatre all over the world, hundreds of Shakespeare Festivals to celebrate his life and work, and endless adaptations of his plays.
Before the travelling group finishes their tour on 23 April 2016, the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, take a look at some of the locations where he and his work have had a profound effect.
Do you have any global Shakespeare facts to add? Let us know in the comments below.
Featured Image: “Conjectural reconstruction of the Globe theatre” by C. Walter Hodges. CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
I note that ‘Mauritius’ is not listed among the countries visited by the travelling group.