The iReadShakespeare team

iReadShakespeare is a federal 501c3 nonprofit. This is our wonderful Board of Directors.

Robin Williams

FOUNDER

While in the middle of writing computer books for a living, I started my first Shakespeare reading group at my home (my home is named The Mermaid Tavern). More than two decades later, we are still reading an entire play out loud on the First Friday of each month.

Because others realized they wanted to read Shakespeare aloud, I opened a public reading group here in Santa Fe in 2011, which has grown over the years. I also helped several other groups gets started. With the various reading groups here in Santa Fe, there are about a hundred people reading Shakespeare together every week! And now that we are online, we have readers from four countries and from states all across the U.S.

When I created an opportunity to go back to school, I chose as my doctoral dissertation the history (and future) of Shakespeare reading groups across the U.S. and U.K. and discovered why these remarkable communities disappeared, giving me the motivation to stir them up again. And why not?

Jean Cheek

Jean Cheek is a mathematician turned accountant who fell in love with language, but particularly poetry. Shakespeare added beauty and depth to that, so she has been happy to be involved in the reading groups and in assisting the organization.

Jay Ann Martin

Jay Ann is interested in physics and reading Shakespearean plays and friends. Now retired, she enjoys the iReadShakespeare reading group because of the many highly intelligent people in the group who offer brilliant insights into the works of the greatest writer in Western history.

Heidi Wolf

Heidi’s background includes history, literature, languages, teaching, and performance, with a longtime love of Shakespeare’s works. She is honored to be a member of the iRS Board!

Jenny Kirby

Throughout her career in family law, Jenny also pursued her interests in language, literature, and history. This led to her discovery of the iReadShakespeare group of which she is privileged to be a member. She is proud to have been invited to join the Board.

Edie Murphy

advisory board

Edie's background includes psychology, social work, teaching, calligraphy, and ancient Greek studies. She has traveled the world via hitchhiking. Edie has a new-found consuming love of Shakespeare’s canon and the art of rhetoric.