‘Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more’. – William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act V, Scene V These are the lines with which Sir Ian McKellen opens his episode of Who Do You Think You Are? As a septuagenarian, looking backwards to discover from whence (and from whom) he came, it is fitting that he should read these particular lines of Macbeth’s. Furthermore, they are …
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At Ford’s Theatre in Washington on 14 April 1865, Abraham Lincoln was shot in the back of the head by John Wilkes Booth. After shooting President Lincoln, Booth jumped down to the stage and shouted, ‘Sic temper tyrannis’ (‘thus always to tyrants’). Wilkes Booth was a member of one of America’s most famous acting families and was also fanatical in his support for the Confederacy. To mark the sad day, here are two early reports of the assassination, as carried …