This January, our cohort of Y12 and Y13 Lang/Lit A-Level students headed to London for a day of culture. After a comfy train ride down to the big city, we pottered from Euston to the British Library to see the Treasures on display there. We saw Shakespeare’s First Folio and the Magna Carta, Jane Austen’s handwritten drafts of ‘Sense and Sensibility’ and even Henry VIII’s ornate bible. It was a miserable and grey day – weather-wise – so many students opted to have lunch in the cafeteria there. We then navigated the tube, travelling to Covent Garden for a spot of window-shopping, before arriving at the Theatre Royal Haymarket for a star-studded production of ‘Othello’ – this is the play we study in preparation for the ‘Dramatic Conflict’ section of Paper 2. David Harewood was brilliant in the final tragic scenes of the play – the staging of Desdemona’s death was especially shocking, I do not think the students will forget it any time soon! However, I think many of the students will most clearly recall the insidious Machiavellianism of Toby Jones’ Iago – a shrivelled, nasty man, intent on meddling in the lives of others and muddying the mind of the noble hero. It was a great introduction to how the play can be interpreted on stage!

 

Mr Williams and I would like to thank the intrepid Lang/Lit cohort for their cheerful company, adventurousness and good spirit on a long day, with delays on the way home. They were fantastic!