Hey you! Get some culture! Patrick Stewart is reciting Shakespeare’s sonnets on Twitter!

I’m not sure how interested people will be but I think this is a lovely idea.

Sir Patrick Stewart – best known as Captain Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation and Professor Xavier from the X-Men films – has been reciting a Shakespeare sonnet every day since around the time we all went into coronavirus lockdown, on his Twitter feed.

It’s a far more accessible way to get to grips with the Bard’s poetry than I ever met before – although that may not be saying much; the language is dense, and it takes a bit of work to get to grips with it.

But, I don’t know, I think it might be worth the effort.

Here’s Sonnet One:

2. When I was a child in the 1940s, my mother would cut up slices of fruit for me (there wasn't much) and as she put it in front of me she would say, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." How about, “A sonnet a day keeps the doctor away”? So…here we go: Sonnet 1. pic.twitter.com/kDoMNhdqcI

— Patrick Stewart (@SirPatStew) March 22, 2020

And why not have Sonnet Two, too:

Sonnet 2. This is one of my favorites. #ASonnetADay pic.twitter.com/aQBzrsETKv

— Patrick Stewart (@SirPatStew) March 23, 2020