Capturing Shakespeare
When our group went to Hill Memorial Library for the first time to observe our item, the first thing we all noticed was this humongous, red, hard-covered book. This folio-sized book stood to be exactly 27.25 inches tall and when opened it was exactly 43 inches wide. We then started flipping through the pages and noticed that the book was rebounded and also that the paper was much thicker than any average piece of paper, the paper also looked worn and torn and had the look and stench of being elderly by having this yellowish, stain-like color throughout the pages of the book due to water damage. The pages contained a bunch of pictures engraved into the book, a mixture of landscapes and the other half of the pictures were of portraits. A lot of the pictures had a lot of classical, mythological interpretations on Shakespeare’s plays, which brought the relationship to Shakespeare’s plays in which he used those elements so well. Above each of the pictures was a description, explaining what the painting was trying to tell the viewers. Also underneath each photo, many of which are filled with nudity, was another description of the painting that included: what characters are featured, what play the picture is from, what act and scene is the picture from, and a quote from the scene of that play. We all tried to think and figure out why someone would want a book of this enormous size, then came to the conclusion that maybe this would possibly be something that would have been shared in a large group of people because of the gigantic size of this book.
Follow this link, [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-nXzRDm2KMw] to find our stop-motion video documenting the imagined life of the oversize folio volume, Boydell's Shakespeare
When you first open up this book, go through the pages, and you skim through the entire book you will only notice that it is completely made up of entirely pictures to give the reader a visual understanding of what the scene would look like in real life of that Shakespearian play. So if you had happen to be asked to make an interpretation of this book, would you think that words or a writing assignment would completely connect to an entire book made of pictures? You probably could but it would be probably be way more difficult rather making collage of pictures into a video to show you how you are using the visual aspect of this video to connect with this book.
Our video is spilt up into different acts to show the viewer the different aspects this book can be used for. When the video first starts you notice the large size of this humongous, red book and how this book’s larger size could be helpful in maybe starting a book club or just for enjoyment purposes that way when you’re with friends you could just open the book, hence there are no words to read so it could be just used for enjoyable times with friends.
The last act in this video we wanted to show the viewer that this book could also be used for research or as a simple reference guide to maybe writing an assignment, or just visually seeing what is taking place and also how maybe Shakespeare’s writing style with different characters gave them their looks and how people probably would have interrupted them based on writing. Having this book as a study guide or reference would be extremely benefit you since you have the pictures available with you all you need now is a Shakespeare play and then you have a great report about Shakespeare with example pictures. Our group saw so many different potential uses for this book that we thought what better way than to upload it to the GEAUX Shak website to tell the whole world of its importance.