Speak the speech, I pray you.*
Hamlet’s advice to the players is always good to follow.
It can be a little tricky, however, when you encounter unfamiliar words.
This is clear to me from my work with Round Robin Shakespeare. Take an American who may have limited experience with Shakespearean English and throw some of those dukes’ names at her, and you could have a problem.
Phonetic spelling is not exactly how it goes.
Gloucester. Worcester. Leicester.
Now, of course, at our monthly meetings, we are not sticklers. We don’t really care if you trip over your tongue rather than speak the speech trippingly upon it.
But maybe some of you will have an audition at some point. Your agent (should you be so lucky) will email you the sides, and there’ll be some mouthful of unfamiliar names or scientific jargon.
What are you going to do?
Well, if all else fails, just say whatever it is confidently—as if you know what you are saying and how to pronounce it. If you get the part, somebody will make sure you get the correct pronunciation.
However, it is probably better to make some attempt to get it right. You can always look it up in a dictionary. But then, you have the additional problem of trying to decipher the diacritical marks put there to help you with pronunciation. I’m not sure they still teach those in school, anymore. (I mean, what can you expect from a curriculum that has decided that cursive is not going to be taught? A generation of people who can’t sign contracts, for one thing.)
Anyway, I found a site to help you out—and not a diacritical mark in sight!
Just enter those unfamiliar names (or other words) into the search box on howjsay, click submit, and listen to a lovely British voice pronouncing the word.
It turns out that Gloucester is Glawster, Worcester is Wooster, and Leciester is Lester—and the Shakespeare will go trippingly on.
* Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act III, Sc 2
