Shakespeare Set Free: Teaching Twelfth Night and Othello

The Folger Shakespeare Library, the nation’s most important center for Shakespeare study and scholarship, is also the center for Shakespeare education. At the Library’s Teaching Shakespeare Institute, scholars, actors, and teachers from across the country work together at the business of teaching and learning Shakespeare. This third volume of the Shakespeare Set Free series is written by institute faculty and participants. The volume sparkles with fine recent scholarship and the wisdom and wit of real classroom teachers in all kinds of schools all over the United States. In this book, you’ll find: Clear and provocative essays written by leading scholars to refresh the teacher and challenge older students Successful and plainly understandable techniques for teaching through performance Ways to teach Shakespeare that successfully engage students of every grade and ability level in exploring Shakespeare’s language and the magical worlds of the plays Day-by-day teaching strategies for Twelfth Night and Othello -- created, taught, written, and edited by teachers with real voices in real classrooms.

Dr. Peggy O’Brien was named the Folger’s director of education in May 2013. A former Folger educator, she established the Library’s education philosophy and the bulk of its programs in the 1980s and led the department until 1994, when she left to become director of education programs for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Her long and distinguished career has brought her numerous awards and honors, including Doctor of Laws honoris causa from Trinity University, Doctor of Humane Letters honoris causa from Georgetown University, the Public Humanities Award from the D.C. Community Humanities Council, and the Folger Shakespeare Library’s 2008 Shakespeare Steward Award. Prior to her first appointment at the Folger, she spent a number of years teaching high school English in the DC Public Schools, and since then has taught undergraduate courses at Georgetown University.