But the main inspiration for my love of Shakespeare and especially the RSC has to lie with John Turner’s appearance in Troilus - Richard Inverne, subscriber

I had become fascinated with Shakespeare at the age of ten when – seeing a display of the Complete Works in W.H. Smith’s window – I persuaded my very impressed uncle to shell out the 10/6d [£12.39 today!] required to buy the weighty tome. I read Julius Caesar because I’d heard of him, and bits of Henry V for the same reason; Shakespeare as Shakespeare was not on the curriculum for ten year-olds!

Jump forward to 1966 and I was then at an all-male boarding school. King Lear was announced as the inaugural production for (incredibly) a new amphitheatre in the grounds, just donated by a wealthy thespian-mad dad (not mine)! The principal roles, including the three sisters [no, not the weird ones...nor the Chekhov mob], had mainly been cast with the older boys, but this proud 14 year-old landed the (doubtless) coveted role of The Herald (you know, he gets about five lines). Just as thrilling was being asked to prompt for the first four-and-a-half acts (another boy took over to allow me to quickly get onstage in the nick of time), which allowed me to absorb [most of] the play by heart – I can still quote huge chunks, and my own version of Goneril (played by my best friend but I privately thought that I should have been playing the role) remains definitive!

So, what’s the RSC got to do with all this (you ask)? Well, the school - being situated not too far from Stratford – hired all the costumes from the RSC, a whole bundle of stuff from vaguely medieval periods [it was a traditional production]. MY costume was chosen for me out of a huge skip by no less than the sixth-former playing Lear (Herald is too lowly for the Director to bother about…). The costume was great – a sort of metallic-looking leather tunic...and I got a sash to go with it (joy!)...and I still have the scroll with the Herald’s announcement! To my further delight...and here I’m finally getting to the point of this memory... there was a name-tag inside the collar. I quote: ‘John Turner. Troilus. 1954’. In those days, of course, you couldn’t just Google him, so I built up this idea that the actor had played one of the title roles [he had actually played Margelon] and all the great Shakespearian roles at Stratford and was very, very famous...and that I simply had to do justice to wearing his costume! So, I did a pretty good Herald and an even better prompter!

That summer, fresh from my twin-triumphs, I nagged and nagged until I was taken to Stratford to see Twelfth Night (Diana Rigg, Ian Holm, Brewster Mason, David Warner, Norman Rodway, Alan Howard…) and Henry V (Holm, Ian Richardson, Patrick Stewart…). Amazing! Pure joy!

Furthermore, in the autumn, I signed up for a school trip to see Henry V (again – a matinee), followed that very evening by the famous Peter Hall Hamlet (Warner, Mason, Elizabeth Spriggs, Estelle Kohler, Tony Church, Michael Jayston…).

So, a glut of Shakespeare that year for an impressionable boy of 14, who grew up to visit the RSC many, many, many times -for the last ten years with my lovely wife- and wanted to become an actor or director. Sadly, I never did achieve those goals. However, at the age of 53 – after several career moves - I became a university lecturer, teaching the history, analysis and theory of the performing arts for fifteen years...so I ended up in “theatre” after all! 

But the main inspiration for my love of Shakespeare and especially the RSC has to lie with John Turner’s appearance in Troilus – a performance I never, of course, actually saw. But thank you, Mr. Turner, still around and soon to reach the grand age of 90, for the loan of your costume and your inspiration...and thank you, RSC, for renting us all those costumes!