Bardolatry, Bill and Barack

Aimee Morris
Dec 11, 2018
2 min read

Celebrating Bill’s big birthday bash.

You know you have a serious case of bardolatry when you and your mates play Pin the Beard on the Bard, bake Shakespeare-themed cakes and press a cookie cutter shaped like the playwright’s face into slices of toast (see evidence in the gallery below). To be fair it was the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, so we had a right to go big.

Until I began my Shakespeare Studies MA, I hadn’t realised that there were other people as Shakespeare crazed as I was. In fact, I soon discovered that I was on the milder end of the bardolatry spectrum. Sure, I prioritised theatre ticket expenditure over groceries (#Aldi) and I stalked Kenneth Branagh like a tween. But my American classmates took bard adoration to the next level...

Shana walked around with a Shakespeare figurine permanently on her person, Caroline took every fancy dress opportunity to impersonate controversial Early Modern characters (#WilliamPrynne), and Melanie was writing a Shakespeare-inspired novel (If We Were Villains, look it up). Plus, the group frequently gathered to play the Shakespeare edition of Cards Against Humanity. Yes that exists.

2016 was a thrilling year for bardolatrists around the globe, with ‘Shakespeare 400’ events happening worldwide. In London we didn’t know what to do with ourselves, such was the extent of the festivities. Shakespeare’s Globe organised The Complete Walk, a series of 37 specially-made short Shakespeare films performed by leading actors; The Guardian commissioned a series of filmed monologues, also performed by legendary actors, called the Shakespeare Solos; and Hogarth launched their Shakespeare Project, which commissions acclaimed novelists to retell Shakespeare’s works.

Things came to a head on Bill’s supposed birthday (23rd April, write it down). We began the festivities with a celebratory brunch - hence the Shakespeare cookie cutter being pressed into slices of toast. Rebecca and Emory did the honours. Shana’s Shakespeare figurine was given a chair of his own, which was indulgent given that he was the size of a Christmas tree ornament. Thinking back, he probably was a Christmas tree ornament - but the point is, he was our embodiment of the birthday boy.

After brunch, we decorated Bill’s birthday cake (with his face, obviously) and waddled across with it to the Globe where we continued to stuff our faces while queuing for a special production of Hamlet. Exciting news travelled down the queue: just hours before, President Obama had visited the theatre and had been presented with a scene from the play.

The Americans were beside themselves. Their second favourite man had come across the pond to pay his respects to Big Bill. Had the President still been around, we’d have offered him an especially large slice of birthday cake. As it was, he’d long been escorted back to Heathrow so we had to gobble down the rest ourselves. Yes We Can and yes, we did.