2016: a big year for the Bard

Among dates that fall in 2016, none will be bigger for Britain than the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare's death on April 23, 1616, aged 52, in Stratford-upon-Avon.

I generally make it a point to visit Holy Trinity Church where Shakespeare is buried, by his famous epitaph, "Blessed be the man that spares these stones,/And cursed be he that moves my bones."

Since Stratford is akin to Rishikesh for Indian literary pilgrims who journey to the UK, I have a small request for British railways - this is to make the return trip from London easier.

A direct service from Marylebone gets you to Stratford-upon-Avon within a couple of hours. However, if you catch an evening performance, there is no convenient service back. An indirect service via Oxford gets you to London around 2am. Then depending on night buses you are lucky to be home by 4am. It is possible to go by the car, of course, but it is a long drive there and back in a day.

There will be a lot to see this year in Stratford, where the Royal Shakespeare Company's main offering will be "Britain's favourite Shakespeare play" - A Midsummer Night's Dream . The lead role of Titania, Queen of the Fairies, has gone to Ayesha Dharker, daughter of the journalist Anil Dharker and poet Imtiaz Dharker.

Ayesha, who has long been settled in Britain, confessed: "I have fallen in love with the RSC because every project I have done with them involves strong women and magical stories with ancient roots - from Scheherazade to Titania."

As part of its plan to take Shakespeare to the people, the RSC will take the play on tour to 14 venues across Britain where the 18-strong professional cast will collaborate with schoolchildren and local amateur drama groups. Ayesha will get to play Titania with no fewer than 14 different Bottoms.

The RSC will also be doing Hamlet and Cymbeline this year.

In London, meanwhile, the Globe Theatre will be showing specially created short films of each of Shakespeare's plays on screens along the banks of the Thames from Westminster Bridge to Tower Bridge over the weekend of April 23-24, 2016.

Ciarán Devane, chief executive of the British Council, summed up: "Power struggles, brutal politics, murder, love, passion, bitter feuds, human weakness and plain farce are universal themes as relevant now as they were when Shakespeare was writing."

Royal duties

The Queen, who has already overtaken Queen Victoria as the UK's longest reigning monarch, will turn 90 on April 21, 2016. But her "official birthday" will be celebrated with a weekend of national commemorations from June 10-12.

But from India's point of view the really big event will be the visit in spring of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Will William and Kate go to the Taj in Agra?

I'd be surprised. It would encourage too much comparison with 1992 when Diana was photographed alone in front of India's abiding monument to love, while Prince Charles remained behind in Delhi. I was on that tour but did not appreciate this was the first public indication that their marriage was falling apart.

Journey's end

On Christmas Day, Britain bid farewell to the Crawley family in what was an emotional moment.

I am referring to the ITV television series, Downton Abbey , which was brought to end by its writer Julian (now Lord) Fellowes after six series and a two-hour "special" on Christmas Day to tie up loose ends.

This was "soap" to be sure, but soap of a very superior variety. It provides a blueprint of what might be possible with a princely Indian family, coming to terms with 1947.

Two questions are worth asking.

Why has Downton Abbey been the most successful series of all time? And why have the characters appeared so real?

Much of the credit has to be given to Fellowes, but it has to be more than that.

Downton Abbey has been filmed at a real stately home, Highclere Castle, a 5,000-acre estate in Hampshire. The first episode, shown on September 26, 2010, was set in April 1912.

Fifty one episodes have brought us to Christmas 1925 and a changed world. The main characters are Robert, Earl of Grantham, and his American-born wife, Cora, and their daughters - Mary, Edith and Sybil - plus the domestic staff at Downton Abbey.

One of the strongest characters is Mr Carson, the butler, who rules the roost "downstairs" and seeks to cling on to the old ways. In the last episode when one of the maids has an emergency delivery "upstairs", the butler remarks memorably: "In Lady Mary's bedroom? Surely not?"

Perhaps the British are still obsessed with class. It would explain why David Cameron is Prime Minister - not despite going to Eton and Oxford in what is meant to be a meritocratic age but because he went to Eton and Oxford.

Time of Hope

The new year ought to bring some cheer to Lady Mohini Noon who had a very difficult 2015 culminating in the death of her "curry king" husband, Lord Gulam Noon.

Her new novel, Black Taj, is being published in London in early summer by Rosemarie Hudson's publishing venture, HopeRoad.

Mohini, who is currently somewhere in Pondicherry, says: " Black Taj is a snapshot of modern India, a tale of angry young men, rich old women, family loyalties and personal desires, and a land where everything changes even when it appears to stay the same."

Mohini and Rosemarie have something in common - both include Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez among their favourite five books.

Mohini's other four books are: Bhagavad Gita, Sri Aurobindo's The Life Divine, P.G. Wodehouse and Rumi.

And this is Rosemarie's four: A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry, The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, Don Quijote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes and Time Life Good Cook Book.

London bound

At long last, Shuchita Sonalika, the Confederation of Indian Industry's UK director, has been granted a work visa on an "exceptional basis" by the Home Office so that she can be based in London - rather than commute between London and Delhi as she was doing.

Denying her a visa was absurd because she was trying to help the UK by bringing in much needed Indian investment.

"I have just picked up my visa and plan to be back in London starting January 17," says Shuchita.

Tittle tattle

Ronald Reagan was an eccentric but engaging President. After meeting Mikhail Gorbachev in Reykjavik in 1986, Reagan telephoned Margaret Thatcher and urged her to read a Tom Clancy thriller on the start of a World War III, Red Storm Rising, as a way of understanding the Russian mind.

This is revealed in a just released secret memo, written by Mrs Thatcher's foreign policy adviser, Chares Powell: "The President strongly commended to the Prime Minister a new book by the author of [ The Hunt for] Red October called (I think) Red Storm Rising. It gave an excellent picture of the Soviet Union's intentions and strategy. He had clearly been much impressed by the book."

Mrs Thatcher had high regard for Reagan but not for his literary tips.