brian lamb: why?irector witmore: "julius caesar" is all about beautiful speeches, those tend to be very popular. americans read them and loved them. so i think "hamlet" took off in the 19th century, it has a lonely hero wants to avenge his father but is a little reluctant to do it, it is a great story about a fully formed person with real problems. brian lamb: in 2011, queen elizabeth came to the white house and here is president obama using shakespeare. [video clip] president obama: to her majesty, the queen, the vitality of the special relationship between our peoples and the words of shakespeare to this blessed plot, this earth, this realm to the queen. director witmore: brian, that has to be a high-pressure moment, even for someone as polished as the president, meeting the monarch, talking about her country, quoting "john of gaunt" from "richard ii," so i think he chose it wisely in his toast. brian lamb: how did shakespeare name his plays? director witmore: that is a great question. the names of

brian lamb: can you use the library? director witmore: to use the rare materials, we ask that you have letters of reference that say you have an important reason to use the material. if you have a really important reason, we want you to. it's not everybody in the whole world in that space, but the rooms are filled with people. some of them are very famous professors or editors, but some of them are high school students who are fellows. we bring them in for a month and do workshops, and they are using the collection. brian lamb: michael whitmore, we are out of time. we thank you come as director of the soldier shakespeare library for joining us, and we will continue this discussion. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at q&anda.org. "q&a" is also available as a c-span podcast. >> if you enjo

brian lamb: what did you hear? director witmore: i heard a very theatrical senator. he picks passages that are so poetic and full of images, and he also moves around, you also notice he has his hand moving here, he is almost ready to move around, he almost sounds like an english professor. brian lamb: what would you say to somebody like me who is not a shakespeare expert, how would you explain it to me? director witmore: sometimes you have to just go with the sound of the words. you would listen to the poetic images and the sounds of the rhymes, and also the way in which he did it, you have to do pause or linger over a long phrase or stop and keep going. i think he is really using the rhythm of the language which is something that shakespeare used so brilliantly. so that he can take english antique and put it into high gear at one moment and then he can slow down, and that is one thing that shakespeare it lets you do if you are a politician. brian lamb: i have an article from "the new york times," and the article states "most politicians quote shakespeare badly, if a

brian lamb is such an amazing person and love the interviews he does. and c-span is such a gift. you as an educator must really appreciate c-span. >> guest: i do. in fact it's one of the things i'm very proud of. one of my former students is steve scully who is here and c-span, figure a long time, a great interview. i knew stay when i was at american university in the 1980s. and another student that year was jim mcgovern who became a member of congress and is a good antiwar liberal anti-help and the war in el salvador. -- and he helped end the war in el salvador. i had gym class and i was kind of worried about him because he made so many a's. >> host: but you don't upgrade. >> guest: i said you've got to get out. you're spending too much time. you're missing out on things. so we said, what do you suggest? i said there's a wonderful women's a shelter in d.c. go down and volunteer and see which you can learn. he was working for congressman than, so he went down and he met women from el salvador who fled in the 1980s. i said can see what's going on down there. he started taking numb

brian lamb: michael witmore, director of the folger shakespeare library.hen did you first notice in your life politicians using shakespeare's quotes?