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Other People's Shoes: Thoughts on Acting
Harriet Walter is well known for her performances at the Royal Court ( Cloud Nine, Hamlet with Jonathan Pryce), the RSC ( Nicholas Nickelby, Macbeth with Antony Sher) and the National Theatre ( Arcadia ), as well on television, where she played Amy on Unfinished Business and Harriet Vane in the Lord Peter Wimsey series. In this book, she uses her experience to illustrate the processes involved in performance.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
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About the author
Harriet Walter
86 books10 followersDame Harriet Mary Walter DBE is a British actress. She has received a Laurence Olivier Award as well as numerous nominations including for a Tony Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. In 2011, she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) for services to drama. She is the niece of Christopher Lee.
Walter began her career in 1974 and made her Broadway debut in 1983. For her work in various Royal Shakespeare Company productions, including Twelfth Night (1987–88) and Three Sisters (1988), she won the 1988 Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Revival. Her other notable work for the RSC includes leading roles in Macbeth (1999) and Antony and Cleopatra (2006). She won the Evening Standard Award for Best Actress for her role as Elizabeth I in the 2005 London revival of Mary Stuart, and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a Play when she reprised the role on Broadway in 2009. She reprised her roles of Brutus in Julius Caesar (2012) and the title role in Henry IV (2014), as well as playing Prospero in The Tempest, as part of an all-female Shakespeare trilogy in 2016.
Her film appearances include Sense and Sensibility (1995), The Governess (1998), Villa des Roses (2002), Atonement (2007), The Young Victoria (2009), Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), The Sense of an Ending (2017), Rocketman (2019) and Ridley Scott's The Last Duel (2021). On television she starred as Harriet Vane in the 1987 BBC Wimsey dramatisations, as Natalie Chandler in the ITV drama series Law & Order: UK (2009–14), in four episodes of Downton Abbey (2013–15), as Clementine Churchill in The Crown (2016), in Succession (2018-), and in the third season of Killing Eve (2020).
(with thanks to Wikipedia)
Walter began her career in 1974 and made her Broadway debut in 1983. For her work in various Royal Shakespeare Company productions, including Twelfth Night (1987–88) and Three Sisters (1988), she won the 1988 Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Revival. Her other notable work for the RSC includes leading roles in Macbeth (1999) and Antony and Cleopatra (2006). She won the Evening Standard Award for Best Actress for her role as Elizabeth I in the 2005 London revival of Mary Stuart, and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a Play when she reprised the role on Broadway in 2009. She reprised her roles of Brutus in Julius Caesar (2012) and the title role in Henry IV (2014), as well as playing Prospero in The Tempest, as part of an all-female Shakespeare trilogy in 2016.
Her film appearances include Sense and Sensibility (1995), The Governess (1998), Villa des Roses (2002), Atonement (2007), The Young Victoria (2009), Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), The Sense of an Ending (2017), Rocketman (2019) and Ridley Scott's The Last Duel (2021). On television she starred as Harriet Vane in the 1987 BBC Wimsey dramatisations, as Natalie Chandler in the ITV drama series Law & Order: UK (2009–14), in four episodes of Downton Abbey (2013–15), as Clementine Churchill in The Crown (2016), in Succession (2018-), and in the third season of Killing Eve (2020).
(with thanks to Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
January 16, 2011
A dear, dear friend brought this book back from the U.K. for me, knowing I shared her passion for all things Harriet Walter. I've been a fan ever since seeing her play the incomparable Harriet Vane in "Gaudy Night," which is both a favorite TV show and a favorite book (from Dorothy L. Sayers' series about Lord Peter Wimsey). To make it even sweeter, "Other People's Shoes" was the subtitle of a Noel Streatfeild book, Theater Shoes, and Walter recently appeared as one of the tenants in "Ballet Shoes." Be still, my geeky, fast-beating heart! It's a book about acting and the theatre and politics and England, all great loves of mine. I loved this book, and I love my friend for thinking of me. Thank you!!!
December 4, 2015
I've been reading this on and off for about 12 years. I bought it in Stratford-upon-Avon as a stagestruck 13 year old and dipped into as i grew up, understanding some bits and being scared off by the complicated bits. Reading now in my twenties, I'm so glad I had the foresight to buy it knowing I'd need it someday. Chockful of brilliantly precise practical advice and examples from her own amazing career, Harriet Walter delineates how to create a convincing character through a mixture of preparation, technique and sheer faith. She also talks about the problems of sexism and racism in the industry and it's disappointing to note that, even some 16 years after this book was first published, a lot of what she wrote remains true. Nevertheless, her rallying cries for a fairer and more representative theatre scene and for more value placed on the arts are heartening at any time. I know I'll keep coming back to this book for help with performance and I'd recommend it to any actor, be they as experienced as Walter or just starting out.
July 19, 2017
It took me longer than strictly necessary to read this, but I savored every page. This book made me a) want to watch all the plays, and b) thankful for Walter's intelligence as an actor, writer, and teacher.
April 21, 2018
Walter is very interesting as a quick guide (pitched pretty well to a non-acting audience, though I imagine many who read it will be interested in acting themselves) through how she thinks about empathy and performance. A good mix of personal anecdote and example and more general ideas and thoughts, and interesting to read from a 2018 perspective considering it was written in 1999 (some of the stuff she writes about the future of the arts and arts funding seems tragically optimistic in that regard, though her hopes for more female projects are, at least at the moment, tentatively coming true).
October 31, 2017
Having read some of Harriet's other essays on Shakespearean roles I was really excited to read this and it didn't disappoint. The way the book is set out makes it really interesting and easy to read. Even if you are not particularly an actor you will enjoy this book that mixes humour and sensible advice. Amazing!!!
November 26, 2007
I love Harriet Walter as an actress, hence my interest. This is a view into Britain's recent decades of theater as well as a view into an actress' decades-long journey. There were many things that spoke to me as a mid-life "creative".
May 31, 2020
Fun read! Well-written thoughts on the world of acting, mainly for stage. Good dose of humour, and surely a great read for anyone starting out with acting, but it's also really interesting from a non-actor perspective
January 6, 2010
loving it. it's odd, she and i had very different childhood experiences, yet and i had extremely similar early childhood feelings about expressing onself and figuring out how to do that.
March 9, 2010
You read the book and you have the feeling Harriet Walter is talking to you. Very down to earth book and a great insight into an actor's life.
February 19, 2022
I admire this woman so much. One of the best theatre experiences I ever had was watching the Donmar all-female Shakespeare trilogy in one day and being moved to tears by Harriet Walter's Prospero.
This memoir is older than her more recent "Brutus and Other Heroines", but just as excellent. She does a really good job of explaining what acting is like, including pointing out the things that most people don't understand about it - like the fact that good acting looks easy and usually isn't.
Her take is necessarily rooted in her experiences coming up in late twentieth-century Britain, and there is a short poetic chapter about who she might have been under other circumstances - if, if, if.
This memoir is older than her more recent "Brutus and Other Heroines", but just as excellent. She does a really good job of explaining what acting is like, including pointing out the things that most people don't understand about it - like the fact that good acting looks easy and usually isn't.
Her take is necessarily rooted in her experiences coming up in late twentieth-century Britain, and there is a short poetic chapter about who she might have been under other circumstances - if, if, if.
October 18, 2017
The second book I've read by Harriet Walter recently. It's not a memoir as such nor is it an acting instruction manual. What Walter does is talk about the acting process for her perspective from learning the lines through to last night curtain call. Although she does touch on film/TV acting her main focus is understandably theatre acting. There are anecdotes threaded throughout it but even for people who aren't actors this is - more or less - an interesting & informative 'peak behind the curtain'.
January 28, 2021
Brilliant, insightful, and true, Walter manages to elucidate the process of theatre making from a collage of her own experiences in such a way that the book serves as both theatrical memoir and handbook for the aspiring (or settled) theatre maker. Equally as necessary for the Shakespearean actor/dramatist as Antony Sher's seminal Year of the King, it is also vital and relevant to the avant garde theatre maker, the community builder, and the filmmaker.
February 7, 2022
The blurb says "My advice ro ayoung actor: Read this book" Richard Eyre
It's just as necessary for e new playwright.
Clearly written and hugley readable, I suspect that some may be looking form ofr from it than is there but I felt at home in this book
It's just as necessary for e new playwright.
Clearly written and hugley readable, I suspect that some may be looking form ofr from it than is there but I felt at home in this book
February 21, 2022
I happened across this book and so grateful I did. A wonderful insight into Harriet Walter’s career and approach to acting, including practical insights into her acting process, all packed in the book full of fascinating and delightful stories from an interesting life and career.
December 31, 2021
My lovely drama teacher gifted me this book, and for that I am ever grateful
October 19, 2025
“Acting is not about being someone different. It’s about finding the similarity in what is apparently different, then finding yourself in there.” – Harriet Walter
Other People’s Shoes is, quite simply, essential reading for anyone who loves acting — whether you’re a performer yourself, a theatre lover, or just fascinated by the craft. Harriet Walter writes with the intelligence, warmth, and honesty you’d expect from one of Britain’s greatest stage actors.
What I adored most about this book is how real it feels. Walter doesn’t lecture or preach — she shares, reflects, and invites you into her process. She talks candidly about the emotional and psychological demands of acting, the joys and insecurities of life on stage, and the balance between craft and instinct. Her insights into Shakespearean roles (particularly her reflections on playing male characters like Brutus and Henry IV) are absolutely fascinating and deeply inspiring.
The writing is elegant yet accessible — never pretentious, always grounded in truth. There’s so much wisdom here about empathy, discipline, and the power of storytelling. I found myself underlining entire pages.
This isn’t just a book about how to act — it’s about why we act. And for that reason, it’s one I’ll return to again and again.
Harriet Walter has given the acting world a gift with this one. Thoughtful, inspiring, and beautifully written — a must-read for anyone who’s ever stepped into someone else’s shoes.
Other People’s Shoes is, quite simply, essential reading for anyone who loves acting — whether you’re a performer yourself, a theatre lover, or just fascinated by the craft. Harriet Walter writes with the intelligence, warmth, and honesty you’d expect from one of Britain’s greatest stage actors.
What I adored most about this book is how real it feels. Walter doesn’t lecture or preach — she shares, reflects, and invites you into her process. She talks candidly about the emotional and psychological demands of acting, the joys and insecurities of life on stage, and the balance between craft and instinct. Her insights into Shakespearean roles (particularly her reflections on playing male characters like Brutus and Henry IV) are absolutely fascinating and deeply inspiring.
The writing is elegant yet accessible — never pretentious, always grounded in truth. There’s so much wisdom here about empathy, discipline, and the power of storytelling. I found myself underlining entire pages.
This isn’t just a book about how to act — it’s about why we act. And for that reason, it’s one I’ll return to again and again.
Harriet Walter has given the acting world a gift with this one. Thoughtful, inspiring, and beautifully written — a must-read for anyone who’s ever stepped into someone else’s shoes.
May 22, 2022
"Why choose this book? You’ll discover plenty of unique approaches to acting that classic technique books can’t provide."
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January 31, 2025
Absolutely loved this book. I will deficiently come back to it in the future.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews