Book Review: WALKING SHADOW LOVE, LOSS AND SHAKESPEARE, By Greg Doran
Grieving for his deceased husband Antony Sher, Doran embarks on a mission to see every First Folio
While The Winter's Tale's regarded as a play of two halves (set in Sicilia and Bohemia), former Royal Shakespeare Company director Greg Doran's poignant and absorbing Walking Shadow is a book of two halves.
The first section of about 100 pages contains diaries by actor Antony Sher (Doran's partner and husband for 35 years). This heart-breaking account, with warm touches of humour, was penned by Sher over a six-month period before he died from liver cancer on December 2, 2021 at the age of 72.
Doran's thoughts from his own diaries written at the same time are interspersed throughout in italics, so readers can differentiate between the two men's chronicles.
The second, lengthier part of the book is Doran's fervent ("crazy", he calls it) pursuit to see as many as 200-plus surviving copies of Shakespeare’s First Folios as he can in the UK, and then around the world. After leaving his post as artistic director at the RSC and moving out of the theatre power couple's Stratford house, his Folio Roadshow marks the 2023 quatercentenary celebration of the First Folio's publication.
Mr William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories & Tragedies – known as the First Folio by modern scholars – is a collection of 36 of Shakespeare's plays. Printed in 1623, about seven years after Shakespeare's death, the First Folio's considered to be one of the most influential books ever published. It's believed that without it we could have lost half of Shakespeare's plays.
I was very moved by actor, writer and artist Sher's The Dying Diaries in the first part of the book. His title for his diaries is Year of the Satsuma, referring to his tumour that's the size of a small orange.
He kicks off by saying a year ago he was playing an old Shakespearean actor dying of liver cancer in what would be his last play, John Kani's Kuene and the King. Now in real life he's an old Shakespearean actor dying of liver cancer. He comments wryly: "Who says that actors don't take their roles home with them?"
I particularly liked reading about how both men have to learn new roles – Sher as patient and Doran as carer. Having recently fractured my humerus (I am pecking slowly at the keyboard with my left hand) I can understand more fully Sher's loss of independence and dignity, and the responsibilities and duties thrust upon an exhausted Doran.
Doran's twin sister Jo questions his subsequent journey to search for First Folios. "So let me get this right, Greg. You are going to try and see fifty copies of the same book? Why?"
He says he wants to track that miraculous book's progress and understand more of Shakespeare's complex legacy. He admits, however, that his sister cannily exposes the true purpose of his "zealous pilgrimage" as a "massive piece of displacement activity".
Kicking off in Stratford, Doran retells an amusing Dorothy Tutin story of how she nearly gave Stratford's First Folio to Pope Paul VI in 1964 by mistake when giving an RSC recital to commemorate 400 years since Shakespeare's birth. She offered the precious tome to the Pope so it could be blessed. He misunderstood and thanked her for the generous gift. Luckily for the RSC the Stratford First Folio was returned. And all's well that ends well.
The joy of this historic, detective book (cosy Shakespeare crime?) is that Doran's Foliomania trek takes him to places like Longleat, Cologne, California, Washington, Kyoto and even Aotearoa to examine all manner of First Folios. Some are in better condition than others, but they all have their own stories to tell – just like characters in Shakespeare's plays.
Doran comes across forgers, millionaires, intriguing annotations, and more. He discovers the only First Folio in public ownership in Birmingham, and a copy owned by the Bute family in Scotland with "Vatman's tears," beads of sweat running from the vatman's arm that are pressed into the pages.
He also discovers that America owns about 150 of the known 235 First Folios in the world. Owners include a Downton Abbey-esque heiress who donates her First, Second and Fourth Folios to the Jesuit University of Loyola Marymount, west of Los Angeles, despite a fraudster trying to cheat her of her archive and riches.
Dorian meets the Emperor of Japan at The Imperial Residence in Tokyo. He's told not to put out his hand, as Naruhito won't be shaking it. But the Emperor comes forward, unexpectedly, "hand extended, and welcomes me into the room". Somehow Shakespeare defies protocol and opens doors like a seasoned diplomat.
Another royal visit is with our very own King Charles, who's been president of the RSC for 30 years. He kindly talks on the phone to Sher when he's dying, and after Doran attends the coronation Charles invites him to examine his First and Second Folios at Windsor Castle. The Second Folio interests Doran, as it was read by King Charles I while he was imprisoned at Carisbrooke Castle on the Isle of Wight before his execution.
King Charles then shows Doran lines he wants to remember after seeing plays at Stratford that he's copied into his own edition of Shakespeare. Touchingly, several from Henry V and Richard II, are about kingship and the death of kings. "The mention of death has recent poignancy for us both," notes Doran.
The book's title refers to the famous quote from Macbeth (Act 5, scene 5):
"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more."
For underlying this engaging, Shakespeare travelogue of sorts, with colour photographs and a helpful index, is the loss of Doran's beloved work and life partner. Transforming such a tragedy into a story with hope is a beautiful thing to do that ultimately benefits both Doran and readers.
Walking Shadow: Love, Loss and Shakespeare by Greg Doran is published by Bloomsbury (£25) and is available now.
Greg Doran's production of Venus and Adonis runs at Arts Theatre Cambridge 9-10 June, Oxford Playhouse 17-20 June, The Pit at the Barbican 23-27 June 23, and York Theatre Royal 30 June and 1 July.
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