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Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show.
This week I’m going to teach you about Shakespeare.
In New Zealand the school subject of English is compulsory until the 6th form – well it was when I was at school anyway. And I think we started learning Shakespeare in fifth form.
So basically everyone in New Zealand has at some point studied Shakespeare. I think most people probably didn’t pay that much attention to it at school. But anyway, everyone knows a little about Shakespeare ... so that is one of the reasons why I think it’s good to know a bit about Shakespeare in English.
And there are a lot of references to Shakespeare in English. For example, in newspaper headlines ... you often see a variation of to be or not to be.
Today I’m just going to introduce Shakespeare and for the next couple of days I’m going to talk about some of his plays.
This is Shakespeare. His first name is William.
He was born in 1564 and died in 1616. He was a poet and a playwright.
A playwright is a person who writes plays.
“He wrote approximately 38 plays and 154 sonnets, as well as a variety of other poems.” (Wikipedia). A sonnet is a kind of poem.
He was born in a town in England called Stratford-upon-Avon.
His Dad’s name was John and his Mum’s name was Mary.
When he was eighteen, he married Anne Hathaway, who was twenty-six.
Apparently, she was pregnant when they were married ... so some people call it a “shotgun wedding”.
“An enforced or hurried wedding, especially because the bride is pregnant”
They had three children.
And William Shakespeare died when he was 52.
So that’s enough about Shakespeare today ... tomorrow I’m going to talk about one of his plays.
STICK NEWS
Kia ora, in Stick News today The Daily English Show presenter is set to become a movie star.
Just days after TDES studio landed an exclusive interview with Tokyo comedian and writer Kevin Cooney the show’s producers are celebrating again after it was announced The Daily English Show presenter may be starring in a movie.
Details of her role in the movie are still under wraps but the director told Stick News he was thrilled to have secured a contract with the hottest star on the internet.
And that was Stick News for Tuesday the 10th of April.
Kia Ora.
the snow report
This is all the snow that’s left in front of our house. Plus a little bit that fell this evening.
conversations with sarah
#211 What Shakespeare plays did you study at school?
Step 1: Repeat Kim’s lines.
Step 2: Read Kim’s lines and talk to Sarah.
Kim What Shakespeare plays did you study at school?
Sarah One year we studied Macbeth. I can’t remember what else we studied ... maybe Henry the somethingth.
Kim Did you enjoy it?
Sarah I think so. I really liked English so I pretty much enjoyed whatever we did. But it was hard.
Kim Why was it hard?
Sarah The language was difficult because we were unfamiliar with it. So it was hard to concentrate.
Kim How different is the language to the English that people speak now?
Sarah It’s quite different.
Kim But you can understand it?
Sarah Yeah, kind of. You can kind of get the general gist ... and you can guess some of the words from the context. But I think to really enjoy it you need to study some of the vocabulary and grammar.
Today's snow report and questionanswer BGM
artist: Jampy
album: Nghzk!
track: Noris
from: Napoli, Italy
album at Jamendo
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