London: Sep 10: Shakespeare, Southwark, and more

On Thursday, September 10, 2009, Di Yin and I had tickets for the afternoon performance of As You Like It at the reconstructed Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. Leaving work before lunch, I decided to spend two hours walking around this neighborhood (Southwark), a neighborhood I'd visited previously for Borough Market. Indeed, this was the main reason I decided to do a walk in an area I've already somewhat explored--as an excuse to be in the area for lunch at Borough Market. (I was elated when I realized the market is open on Thursdays.)

I took pictures along this outing.

Southwark is definitely an area that, when most of the buildings were built, was not inhabited by the wealthy. Indeed, centuries ago, it used to be tenements. It has the feel of a place that used to house the down and out.

Within Southwark, I visited the Southwark Cathedral, which is rightly called a cathedral. It's fairly impressive. It has monuments and stained glass that are as nice as the ones at St. Paul's. It has lots of memorials, somewhere between the density of St. Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey, though it's smaller than both. I could've taken pictures if I bought a permit, but decided not to. (I figured if I made it through St. Paul's and Westminster Abbey without pictures, taking pictures of this less impressive sight might blur my memories of all three.) Also, Southwark Cathedral provided a handy walking guide and occasional plaques too, a nice touch.

I ate lunch in Borough Market, which had fewer shops open and was less crazy than on Saturdays, but certainly had more than enough shops open to be interesting.

I met Di Yin at the reconstructed Globe Theatre. It was made with traditional materials and even used the building techniques from the time. Neat! This also meant the theatre's design is unlike most modern theatres -- the audience is arranged into rings that go 180 degrees around the stage. The inner ring is for standing people; the outer, for sitting ones. The rings are about equally sized, meaning about half the audience is standing. This, combined with the small size of the theatre, gave the show a very lively feel; the audience seemed more engaged with the show than most plays I've attended. Indeed, sometimes it felt as if the audience were part of the show as the actors walked among them to get on and off the stage and even acted parts of scenes on the grounds in front of the stage. The crowds parted as necessary. (This is probably why if you buy tickets for the standing section, you're not allowed to sit down. Ushers will remind you of the rules if you do.)

Di Yin and I thought it'd be uncomfortable to stand for several hours, so we bought seated tickets. This may not have been much better, as the (bench) seats were very tough and our butts ached by the end. Ah, one downside of old-fashioned theatre design.

As for the play itself, As You Like It, I hadn't seen or read it previously. I thought the story was decent, though parts of it felt like mere ploys and some characters felt superfluous. Think romantic comedy that's not particularly tightly plotted. I enjoyed the play: the acting was good, and the actors even danced in the last act. The themes include how quickly one's perceived social status can change, the foibles of love, and the freedom of speech.

From the extensive playbill I learned some interesting things about how Shakespeare wrote. For instance, I learned that he wrote As You Like It partially to exercise the abilities of a new actor in his company, Robert Armin, who specialized in playing fools, after his last leading fool, William Kemp, moved on. I'd never previously thought of Shakespeare as having particular actors in mind for his roles while writing his plays, though in retrospect it should've been obvious. I also learned that As You Like It's style is partially a response to a recent change in the theatrical experience: some newly-opened acting companies in London used choir boys as actors and included much singing in their performances. Presumably in reaction, Shakespeare made As You Like It have more boy actors and more songs than any of his other plays. In these ways, though the plays are timeless, they do reflect the local milieu.

We decided not to allocate time or money to tour The Globe's exhibition on Shakespeare or to tour the theatre's backstage.

After the play, we walked across Millennium Bridge to get to the tube. I returned to work.

Later, we grabbed dinner at a place near work that I'd been eying: Wilton Cafe, labeled as Turkish Pide Salon. Its menu includes pide (basically boat-shaped Turkish pizza), lahmacun (round Turkish pizza), and gözleme (gozleme) (Turkish crepes). Pides are hard to find and the others even harder. We talked to the chef about what to order, and he made it fresh. :) The pide I had was pleasing but not great.

On the way home, Di Yin convinced me to ride a double-decker bus for a couple stops (before we needed to get off to get on our regular single-decker which plies the route to our street). To think I've been in London for more than a month without riding one of these. It was great! I can certainly see the appeal of those sight-seeing buses. Through the huge, bubbly windows, we could look down on everything, and across to second-story windows. There's even a roller-coaster aspect to the ride: getting tossed around a bit (especially when on the stairs) when the bus turns, wondering what'll happen as we rapidly approach a bulldozer parked in our lane, and seeing people running across the road where the bus is about to go.