Autism and Classical Myth: Staging the upturned world: A Midsummer Night's Dream for autistic children

Why classical myth and autism?

Why classical myth and autism?

The idea for this project started to take shape at a meeting in 2008 with a special needs teacher, who mentioned that, in her experience and those of her colleagues, autistic children often enjoy classical myth. I began to wonder why this might be the case, and whether – as a classicist who researches, and loves, classical myth – there was anything I could contribute. I started this blog to report on my progress which was often sporadic until the launch of the Warsaw-based European Research Council-funded project Our Mythical Childhood (2016-22) to trace the role of classics in children’s culture.

My key contribution to the project is an exploration of classics in autistic children’s culture, above all by producing myth-themed activities for autistic children. This blog shares my progress, often along Herculean paths, including to a book of lessons for autistic children focusing on the Choice of Hercules between two very different paths in life. The image above, illustrating the homepage of this blog, is one of the drawings by Steve K. Simons, the book's illustrator, of a chimneypiece panel in a neoclassical villa at Roehampton in South West London. The lessons centre on this panel.

Tuesday, 25 September 2018

Staging the upturned world: A Midsummer Night's Dream for autistic children

In June, I broke the news - here - that myself and colleagues had been successful in our application to host events for the 2018 Being Human Festival. I included the following piece of information:

"With the most explicit fit with my autism and classical mythology project...we will be working with the Flute Theatre, who will stage an immersive performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream for children on the autistic spectrum. I’ll say more on this in due course, including where I write about who the Flute are and about the work they do."

Here - now - I'll say some more as promised. The Flute Theatre is a troupe of actors who, led by the Kelly Hunter, stage productions of Shakespeare for autistic audiences. We'll be collaborating with them during their run of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond, London, from (and whence the photo at the head of this posting) 5-24 November 2018.

The collaboration will be as follows - along with two colleagues, Drs Helen Slaney and Susanne Greenhalgh, I'll be taking part in a participatory workshop at the Orange Tree in the morning before one of the performances - on 23 November. Kelly Hunter will introduce the techniques she uses with her audiences - and she will show how and why they've been such a success.

To quote from the blurb on our booking site (link below):

Shakespeare is often regarded as linguistically challenging and culturally elitist, but this does not have to be the case when the plays are performed. Approaching "A Midsummer Night's Dream" from a non-neurotypical perspective gives an extra dimension to its upturned world of magic, mischief, delusions, and desires. Flute Theatre's approach taps into the multisensory undercurrents of dramatic literature, making this workshop at the same time a fascinating exploration of theatrical practice.

If you'll be in or near London in November and would like to join us, there's more information here, including on how to book. I'll be blogging on it as well...