Folger Shakespeare Library Website to Feature Gloria Betcher's Drama Forum Prompts

At the Fourth Blackfriars Conference, held at the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, VA, Oct. 24-28, it was announced that the prompts for an online discussion forum created for Dr. Gloria Betcher's spring 2006 English 450 Drama Seminar had been selected for posting on the Folger Shakespeare Library's Web site. The forum, titled "Constructing The Castle," focused on the fifteenth-century morality play The Castle of Perseverance (ca. 1440), the manuscript of which includes the earliest staging diagram known for a play written in English. Students from Dr. Betcher's seminar on Devils, Demons, and Damnation in Early British Drama discussed the staging of The Castle with students in Dr. Alan Baragona's medieval drama seminar at Virginia Military Institute and worked on teams with VMI cadets to post responses to prompts supplied by the professors. The professors, who partnered to  design and facilitate the forum, were also acknowledged in the Blackfriars' Conference educational summary for their creative approach to the teaching of early drama and staging techniques.