On Tuesday Feb. 4, 2025, Winona State University English professors, English students and their friends took a trip to Minneapolis to see an age-old play. No matter how late they got back, the bus trip and the tiring Tuesday evening was well worth it to see the Guthrie Theater’s production of William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
For the past few years, the English Department office has been making a trip to the Guthrie Theatre not only because Shakespeare is an integral part of any English Majors repertoire, but because there is something larger to be gained from the experience.
Sarah Schmick, a standing third year Communications, Arts, and Literature Teaching (CALT) major here at Winona State, was on the trip to see “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and found that she went partially for Shakespeare and partially for the community.
“I have read it [“A Midsummer Night’s Dream”] once, but it was in high school and I wasn’t really fascinated by it, so I wanted to see it now,” Schmick said. “Plus, I think it’s good community building. Like, I’ve gone to other colleges and it’s really hard to get involved, so I feel like we have a lot more opportunities, especially in this department.”
This community building that Schmick has found among the Winona State English Department was one of the roots of taking this trip in the first place. Going back a few years, English Professor Ann-Marie Dunbar started the tradition and her fellow English Professor, Andrew Higl, carries it on now.
Another aspect of this trip that pushes Professor Andrew Higl to continue ensuring it goes on is that it allows English majors, as well as others, to experience literature outside of the classroom. “There are more possibilities to make [the literature] come alive and make it sort of ‘mean’ in different ways if you actually experience it differently,” Higl said.
This different experience of seeing this famous play performed was not lost to students who went on this trip. For many, this was their first time seeing a Shakespeare production live instead of just reading it or watching it on a screen, and the Guthrie Theater’s production made it feel more accessible for all students, not just those who’ve never read Shakespeare before.
“I liked how they made it seem modern in a way that was still cool,” Schmick said. “It was easy to understand what they were saying because of their actions; where, just reading it would be kind of like, “what’s happening,” but they were so expressive that you knew, even though the language was a little bit harder to understand.”
Part of the reason many students don’t pursue English or just don’t like reading older novels and plays, like “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” by Shakespeare, is because it is inaccessible to them in terms of language. However, going to see a production is one of the ways that a Shakespearian play may be more accessible beyond just English Majors.
“You see stuff about like, oh, interest in this stuff is waning and things like that, but to get 40 students to be like on a Tuesday night—Tuesday afternoon— “lets go up to the cities to see a Shakespeare play,” I don’t know, that’s pretty special to me. Just sharing that experience.” Higl said.
This shared experience and the accessibility becoming easier to digest is a combination that makes students and professors look forward to the next trip to the Guthrie Theater.
