theater, literature, sleep

I saw a production of Hamlet (did not like at all - fairly boring and not well done) and a production of Twelfth Night (fantastic, fantastic, lovely) this week, which was very nice after a month of reading Shakespeare plays. And yesterday we visited Shakespeare's grave in Christ Church, and his wife's childhood home among other touristy Shakespeare sites.

I am reading Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh, and am about 2/3 finished right now. It is such a wonderful book! I now want to read much more of his - it is as though the whole story is a subtle rise to one inciting moment, and then you look back and see a dozen other inciting moments throughout the book, woven in. There is a beautiful sense of quiet desperation in the writing.

This Sunday some of the girls are making a pilgrimage to Highclere Castle, the filming site of Downton Abbey. We've been watching an episode a night when we have time all crowded on the bed and windowseat in my room, and I am actually nerdishly excited to go see it. I don't think it is something I would ever do on my own, but with this group .  . . delightful.