Shakespeare selfie challenge
By: Sherrie Cheng
On 12 May, 2016, the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) announced the finalists for the 2016 Shakespeare Selfie student writing competition. Grade 11 Lauren Chang was the grand prize winner in the Grades 10 to 12 category with her soliloquy My Mistress With A Monster Is In Love.
The challenge was to write a modernized soliloquy or monologue from the perspective of a Shakespearean character based on a prominent news or pop culture event that occurred between April 2015 and April 2016. Over 500 students from across Canada participated. The submissions were judged by bestselling young adult author Kenneth Oppel. The winners were selected on a variety of factors, including the originality of the subject, use of language and writing style. Lauren was later featured on CBC reading her soliloquy. It can be found at the following link:
http://www.cbc.ca/books/2016/05/my-mistress-with-a-monster-is-in-love-by-lauren-chang.html
Lauren entered the competition because of the interesting prompt. She also said that “I never turn down the opportunity to write something that not only rhymes, but uses iambic pentameter.” As the grand prize winner, Lauren won an iPad mini and fifty young adult novels for the school library.
