Our Shakespearean fever continues this summer! We are offering a very special mini course (for one night only) on the 10-11th of June based all around As You Like It, one of the Bard’s most raucous and twisting comedies! Experience the players’ journey into the delight and magic of the Garden of Arden with a trip with Novel English to see the play performed in the Friend’s Seats at the Minack Theatre, one of Cornwall’s highlights and certainly the perfect place to spend a magical evening (I have included a photo of the gorgeous setting of the theatre for those who do not know about it already!) We will be having a picnic on the Porthcurno cliffs beforehand, with the chance perhaps to see pods of dolphins passing by! The second day will be spent at Trelugga, reading and performing the play with homemade scones, clotted cream and jam as part of high tea! This proves to be an amazing experience for all participants, and as the course has limited places, make sure to phone, email or message us to book your slot as early as possible! Looking forward to hearing from you!

Next weekend- 7th-8th of May- Novel English is offering a special mini course based around LM Montgomery’s wonderful novel, Anne of Green Gables! Participants will have the chance to attend the play of the book and to take a follow-up creative writing session at Trelugga. With a focus on the 19th century in America, we will read and perform excerpts from the book, including Anne dying her hair, plying Cordelia with the wrong type of raspberry cordial and playing the tragic Lady of Shallot! Not to be missed, this weekend course promises an opportunity to get creative with reading, writing and performance! Do get in touch via our phone, email or Facebook page more information!

Hello folks! The end of April is nigh (isn’t this year going fast!?) and here at Novel English we are planning our next course, which will be taking place over the May half term. This course will focus exclusively on the works and lives of the Bronte sisters, Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte and Anne Bronte. This extraordinary literary family is a testament to female English writers and we are so excited to get the course underway! We will be focusing on Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre this time and we are sure that everyone will come away with a new favourite book for life! The character of Jane is a wonderful example of strong female characters in literature and the novel was groundbreaking for the time by having a woman as the central character.
The course will include a reading (and of course acting out!) of the playscript and you will have the chance to attend the ballet production! Especially suitable for 10-12 year olds who have not yet read the book, we guarantee (we hope!) a life long love of the Bronte sisters and their works! Do get in touch via our email, phone or Facebook page for more information and to book your place!

Don’t forget that we are celebrating the Bard this month; we will be kicking off with The Ides of March course where we will delve into Julius Caesar! An opportunity to discuss the themes of bravery, envy, betrayal, ambition, assignation and conspiracy in the Roman court! The play offers thought provoking questions on the role of leadership and what it means to lead! Discover what it means to be a tribune compared to a citizen; what it means to a soothsayer and to be influenced by predictions, omens and superstitions! All this with the opportunity to wear Roman robes and have a chance to conquer your enemies with your sword!

Do get in touch via our email, phone or Facebook page if you would like to know more!

Beware the Ides of March!

Today is the 3rd of March and that means that Novel English wants to wish you all a very Happy World Book Day 2016! What are you reading today? We would love you to let us know on our Facebook page!

We have just finished our February half-term course here at NovelEnglish and I am here to let you know that there are now some photos on our Facebook page! Do have a look! This time we were focusing on the works of that most quintessential of English female authors, Jane Austen; the course included looking at the 18th Century way of life, learning about the balls, the hairstyles and the dances which Austen portrayed so often in her writing. The students also wrote and performed their own script! A wonderful time was had by all- a very lovely way to begin the Novel English new year 2016! Thank you to all who attended the course, we do hope to see you at Trelugga again soon!

Hello folks! Here it is then; the briefing of Novel English courses for 2016! We have planned a huge variety of exciting workshops for different age groups so there is sure to be something that takes your fancy! Do have a look through, and get in touch to book your place and/or discuss anything with us!

• Monday 15th- Friday 19th February: Pride & Prejudice and Austen’s 18th Century (ages 11-13)

During the Easter Holidays we are planning a month long celebration of the works of Shakespeare for his 400th anniversary; the courses will run as follows:

• 19th-25th March – Children’s Literature Course: The Tempest (ages 9-11)
• 26th March-1st April – The Ides of March Course: Julius Caesar (ages 11-13)
• 4th-8th April – Children’s Literature Course: Twelfth Night (ages 9-11)
• 9th-15th April – Women and Justice: Measure for Measure and The Merchant of Venice (ages 14-16)

So, an entire Easter of Shakespearean celebrations!

During the May half-term we will be running a wonderfully exciting course celebrating the Brontë sisters:

• 28th May-4th June – Celebrating the Brontës: Charlotte Brontës, Jane Eyre and the 19th Century (ages 11-13)

On to the summer!

• 1st-5th August – Children’s Literature Course: Pirates, Smugglers and Treasure (ages 9-11)
• 8th-12th August – Fantastical Worlds: The Water Babies and exploring Cornish rock pools (ages 9-11)
• 15th-19th August – Sea Adventures: the works of Michael Morpurgo (ages 9-11)

Please Note: During July and September 2016 we will be running several Holistic English courses- these are courses specially designed for overseas students who wish to improve their English language skills in a fun and interactive environment. We will be releasing exact dates and topics for these courses in due course so watch this space!

Hello folks! First of all, apologies for the blog and Facebook pages being so quiet in the last month! Secondly, Happy New Year 2016 from all of us here at Trelugga! Things have not stopped at Novel English! In December we held our much awaited Christmas course, which focused on Victorian ghost literature, and most particularly Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol!

The course was a fun packed few days in which the participants feasted on Victorian favourites: hot buttered crumpets, a full English roast supper and mince pies made by the children themselves!

We had discussions on Christmas traditions such as why robins are so frequently featured on festive cards, the making of paper chains (which served as useful props for the chains of Jacob Marley’s ghost) and the decoration of the wonderful Trelugga Christmas tree. Once the tree was decorated with traditional decorations, tinsel, lametta and real Christmas tree candles, there was ample time for cosy fireside storytelling, reading the novel itself (as well as its play script) and on the last night a dose of Christmas carol singing! There was also sessions of classic Victorian party games, the favourites being Blind Man’s Buff and Wink Murder in the dark (during which there were some spectacular deaths!)

In the daytime there were plenty of excursions, which included visiting an old graveyard where the Ghost of Christmas Past showed Scrooge his tomb and a walk above Kynance Cove on Winter Solstice where Scrooge and the Spirit of Christmas Present saw the lighthouse and ships out at sea.

On the final day, after a quick lunch, the children gathered their props and costumes together and performed a play for parents and grandparents which they had written themselves. The audience were suitably impressed! After many cries of ‘Merry Christmas!’ the course came to an end.

We will be putting photos of the course up on our Facebook page in due course, so do have a look!

As always we at Novel English would like to say a massive thank you to everyone who came along, and we hope to see you at one of our 2016 courses too! Watch this space for further details!

Here at Novel English we celebrated the coming of autumn with a course designed all around Shakespeare’s ‘unlucky’ play… (for those of you who dare to speak it, Macbeth!) The course began with an evening activity of discussing the famous symbol of the Tudor Rose and the children decorating the front of their notebooks with print outs of Tudor designs. On the second day the course focused on Act One of the play and we set off to the Goonhilly Downs (the nearest thing we have to the wild Heath!) to rehearse and discuss scenes; the morning was followed up with a lunch of homemade cornish pasties, kindly made for us by our neighbouring farmer. Once all pasties had been eaten, we returned to Macbeth: the children writing a letter from Lady Macbeth to her husband, using traditional Shakespearian quills (made out of owl, goose, pheasant and crow feathers) and green ink.

Onto day three, and we decided to concentrate on the complex characters of Duncan and Banquo; first of all, there were daggers to make, crowns to forge and a goblet for the poisoned wine to design. The children had a creative time making these essential props, as well as using some fake blood (purchased for the event at the Globe Theatre in London). Once the children had made, tried out and practised with the vital props, we set about rehearsing the banquet and chamber scenes. The performance was held in the Novel English dormitory and was acted superbly; the blood left dripping from the dagger and left behind on poor King Duncan’s murdered throat looked most impressive! The tortuous assassination of heroic Banquo was then acted out in a nearby woodland.

The blood-curdling did not stop there, as it was on to day four and the acting out of the Banquet Scene and the arrival of the ghost of Banquo- heralding doom for Macbeth! Then it was time for some potion brewing and magic making; the two caldrons appeared and names and recipes planned and executed! Once the potions had been bottled and the four witches (including the high witch, Hecate) and Macbeth were well rehearsed, it was time to don witch-like garbs and face paints and to summon the apparitions! This was done by the roaring bonfire, as magic always should be!

On day five of the course, we improvised scenes and performed them for each other: Lady Macbeth sleep walking and dying and the coming of Birnam Wood, walking over the hill into battle (with branches and leaves held high!), and finally the last fight between Macbeth and Macduff, ending of course with Macbeth’s demise!

Throughout the course, the children participated in less blood-fuelled activities too, such as a moonlit walk, a midnight feast (with a magic show designed and executed by the children themselves) and various drawing and writing exercises based around the play and Master Shakespeare himself! Most enthusiastically received was the colourful timeline about Shakespeare and his plays.

The course participants also wrote and rehearsed their own play, called Changing; this was performed for all of us at Novel English and also to some of the parents when they arrived for pick-up time on the last day.

From all of us at Novel English, we would like to thank all who came and helped make the course such a success, as well as wishing you all a happy autumn and happy Sambain!

Last week, over the half term break, we had a specially spooky, blood-thirsty autumn course at Novel English- we were focusing on Shakespeare’s ‘unlucky’ play: Macbeth! We have put some photos on our Facebook page, so do have a look! We will also be sharing more pictures of the course soon and we will be writing a longer blog post about it too, so watch this space! Happy November everyone!