• About
  • Author Appearances & Events
  • Contact Me
  • Editing
  • Speech Arts
  • Teaching
  • Writing

Ruth Daniell

~ poet, writer, editor, teacher

Ruth Daniell

Tag Archives: Hamlet

CBC Canada Writes Shakespeare Selfie Winner

16 Friday May 2014

Posted by Ruth Daniell in Announcements & News, Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Alexi Zentner, CBC, CBC Canada Writes, devoiced women, dramatic monologue, exciting news, Hamlet, interview, Ophelia, poetry, Shakespeare Selfie, William Shakespeare, writing, writing competition

Outside Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London. Photo credit: James Daniell

Outside Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London. Photo credit: James Daniell

I’m tickled pink that today I get to tell you that I’m the winner of the Canada Writes Shakespeare Selfie contest, with my poem, “Ophelia, Attending a Garden on the Ground Floor of a Vancouver Apartment Building.” The announcement went live this morning! The judge, Alexi Zentner–whose most recent novel, The Lobster Kings, is a retelling of Cordelia’s story from King Lear–said some really kind things about my poem:

While many writers captured Shakespeare’s language to great success, I felt like this piece captured Ophelia herself while riffing on Shakespeare’s poetics. I was particularly taken with the way she has Ophelia see how nothing can be everything: ‘There doesn’t seem to be any significance to rhododendrons—they just grow well here on the West Coast.’ One of Shakespeare’s gifts was to bestow humanity on all of the characters on the stage, great and small, to understand that no matter how few lines we get to speak, we are always in our own spotlight. I think that’s what the author is doing and that seems to get to the heart of a selfie.

I’m so pleased that my poem has gotten so much attention; it’s strange and lovely to know that people are reading something I wrote. The kind folks at CBC did a short interview with me, too,  in which I talk a little bit about my current writing project, my interest in “devoiced” women, and why–out of all the Shakespeare characters–I chose to write from the point of view of Ophelia. You can go ahead and read the entire Q & A!

Congratulations to the winners of the youth (12-18) category, and all my fellow Shakespeareans. It’s been a fun contest!

The Globe Theatre was a hightlight of my trip to Europe in August 2013.

Visiting the Globe Theatre was a hightlight of my trip to Europe in August 2013.

CBC Canada Writes Shakespeare Selfie Shortlist

14 Wednesday May 2014

Posted by Ruth Daniell in Announcements & News, Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

CBC Canada Writes, dramatic monologue, garden, Hamlet, Ophelia, poem, poetry, Shakespeare, Shakespeare Selfie, shortlist, Vancouver, writing competition

Canadian Shakespeare Selfie Challenge

As a follow up to my last post, I am pleased to report that my poem, “Ophelia, attending a garden on the ground floor of a Vancouver apartment building,” made the shortlist of CBC Canada Writes Shakespeare Selfie Challenge. You can follow the links and read all the shortlisted entries if you like–including mine, if you haven’t already!

Here is the shortlist!

And here is the link straight to my poem: “Ophelia, attending a garden on the ground floor of a Vancouver apartment building.”

Ophelia and the arrival of spring flowers

12 Monday May 2014

Posted by Ruth Daniell in Announcements & News, Poetry, Publications

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

andrea bennett, birthday, CBC Canada Writes, devoiced women, dramatic monologue, flowers, Hamlet, Ophelia, poem, poetry, rhododendrons, Shakespeare Selfie, spring, sunshine, the writing life, Vancouver, William Shakespeare

Image from CBC Canada Writes

Recently, the world celebrated William Shakespeare’s 450th birthday. Well, that’s our best guess, anyway, anyone who’s studied Shakespeare will tell you: we only know what day he was christened, so we assume April 23rd is his birthday. Regardless, there were some  pretty fun celebrations of the Bard around the world, including “Cakespeare,” a contest hosted by the Victoria & Albert Museum in London to design Shakespeare’s birthday cake.

Instead of designing cake, CBC Canada Writes asked Canadians to take a Shakespearean character, situate him or her in a present-day scenario, and write a new soliloquy or monologue for that character, as part of their (goofily-named) “Shakespeare Selfie” challenge, which ran from April 14 to May 9.Rhodo 2

Ah, well, I can’t resist a challenge to write a dramatic monologue, and I spend a lot of my time dreaming up speeches for devoiced princesses, anyway, so I thought I’d try my hand at a Shakespeare character, too, just for fun. I am pretty pleased to tell you that my monologue has been published on the Canada Writes website as today’s pick of the day:  “Ophelia, attending a garden on the ground floor of a Vancouver apartment building.” You can go read it!

Don’t let Canada Writes’ cheerful blurb on the poem fool you. The poem is pretty depressing. It is from the point of view of poor Ophelia, after all, whose father died, boyfriend left her, and then her brother took off to France to leave her to deal with her grief alone.Hostas

If you’re not Ophelia, though, I imagine it’s pretty hard to be too sad in Vancouver right now. I’m absolutely loving the sunshine, here, and all the flowers. I feel a bit silly about all the macro shots of daffodils, rhododendrons, roses, tulips, irises, lilacs that I can’t help myself from snapping with my iPhone; it proves that my photography ambitions have not changed much since I was an eleven-year-old girl. But it’s hard not to revel in all this beauty! Plus, it’s clearly ice-cream-eating season now, and that makes me happy too.

It’s also the season for a lot other exciting things in the world of poetry! Last Friday I went to andrea bennett‘s launch of Candoodlers, her debut poetry collection from Nightwood Editions. It is an excellent book and it was an excellent celebration. That same evening, the finals of the Poetry in Voice youth recitation contest took place, and that is pretty inspiring. I love to see poetry’s power put right out there and discussed.

What kinds of grist are you pouring into the poetry mill this spring? And are you also taking a bunch of photos of spring flowers?

The Brightest Thing (Poems)

Boobs (anthology)

Boobs: Women Explore What It Means to Have Breasts

Four Portraits (chapbook)

Archives

Swoon Reading Series

Ruth Rhymes

Bolton Academy of Spoken Arts

Blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy