The enthusiasts of Shakespeare’s theatre and creativity should necessarily visit the Shakespeare Theatre in Gdańsk. Modern theatre has blossomed in Europe since the end of the 16th century. Born in Elizabethan England, it began to spread across the continent through migrant groups of English actors who, traveling from city to city, lived from exhibiting popular plays freely translated into local languages. In German countries these actors were called ‘Englische Comoedianten’. In 1612, they first arrived in Gdańsk. It was a group of actors led by a certain John Green. It was in Gdańsk where, during the life of Shakespeare, English theatre plays, including the works of Shakespeare himself, were staged for the first time in the lands of the Commonwealth. There are references in sources about the exhibition of adaptations of ‘The Merchant of Venice’, ‘The Two Gentlemen from Verona’ and ‘Titus Andronicus’. In the following years, other acting groups played ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and ‘Julius Caesar’ in Gdańsk. The performances were played in the so-called ‘School of Fencing’, accorded for this purpose, located in the foreground of the walls of the Main Town near Podwale Przedmiejskie. With time, the school began to be regularly accorded for theatrical performances, and its building was made similar in form to the Elizabethan Fortune Theatre in London. Nowadays, the tradition of the Gdańsk Shakespeare Theatre has been resurrected, and the modern theatre building, designed by the Italian architect Renato Rizzi, was erected exactly in the same place where the former ‘School of Fencing’ was 400 years ago.
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