Image from http://www.theguardian.com
We’ve all probably read a Shakespearean play at some point, probably in high school and college. Regardless, even those of us who haven’t read Shakespeare know one thing; he’s dead. It’s been about 397 years since William Shakespeare died, which seems rather close to a certain number, doesn’t it? That’s right, the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death will be in 2016. No doubt there will be parties held by his faithful readers.
To celebrate, The Hogarth Project has been created by the Hogarth imprint of Random House and will launch in 2016. Its goal is to create modernized novel adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays. The project was thought up by Juliet Brooke; Clara Farmer; and Becky Hardie, executives at Chatto and Windus. The plan is for the novels to be published worldwide in all mediums.
Four authors have already been signed onto the project. Jeanette Winterson and Anne Tyler, the first to join, will be tackling “The Winter’s Tale” and “The Taming of the Shrew” respectively. Margaret Atwood has chosen “The Tempest”, while Howard Jacobson has decided to undertake “The Merchant of Venice”. Meanwhile, The Hogarth Project is still waiting for writers to step up and take the rest of Shakespeare’s plays.
It seems like an exciting time for remakes, considering the recent successes of modernized web series adaptations of classic novels, such as the Lizzie Bennet Diaries.
