Alas, poor Shakespeare! I don't know him well: The Londoners who think The Bard was a Roman Centurion


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The Evening Standard

Despite being England’s most famous playwright, more than one in ten Londoners are unable to identify William Shakespeare as a writer, according to a new study.

A total of 12 per cent of people in the capital had no idea who he was - suggesting a series of bizarre alternative professions for him.

Of those who answered incorrectly, six percent believed that Shakespeare was an artist, two percent thought he was a Roman Centurion, and the same amount thought he was a celebrity.

One in 100 thought he was a cartoon character and the remaining one percent had no knowledge of him at all.

Over a fifth of Londoners also incorrectly answered that Shakespeare hailed from London, not Stratford-upon-Avon.

Nationally, five percent of 18-34 year olds thought Shakespeare’s most famous play was Cinderella, and two percent of the same group thought Shakespeare himself was a fictional character. Almost a third of under-12’s admitted to not knowing who Shakespeare was.

A staggering 49 percent of adults were unable to complete the line “O Romeo, Romeo...!”(wherefore art thou Romeo?), with some adults opting for the less traditional endings; “Take me I am yours!”, “Juliet, Juliet!”, “Where are you Juliet?” or simply, “I love you!”

However, almost half of Brits identified Macbeth as Shakespeare’s most recognisable character.

Tom Hiddleston, star of Shakespearian DVD The Hollow Crown, believes the dramas make Shakespeare easier to understand for a younger audience; “I hope what makes these films accessible and immediate to a contemporary audience is that I think we have for the first time spoken it very differently, spoken with a fluency and an ease and a very off the cuff spontaneity. Shakespeare is at its best when you speak it like you’re making it up, when it sounds as if it was written yesterday.”

Co-star Jeremy Irons believes that Shakespeare should not be taught at school; “I think so many people are put off Shakespeare at school and like so much of drama you have to see it in order to be moved by it and then you begin to go back to the text and you begin to understand the world, the imagination behind those words.”

According to Paterson Joseph, who also stars in the new drama,  the classroom is the worst place for it to be taught; “The classroom setting is probably in my opinion the worst place to come to Shakespeare first because Shakespeare never intended his works to be read in a classroom, he intended his works to be heard and to be seen.”