IS Shakespeare's Rose Theatre the only Shakespeare show in town, Bard none?

Not so, because the York Shakespeare Project is taking to the city streets and parks for a third round of Shakespeare Sonnet Walks from tomorrow evening to July 28, having done so in 2014 and 2017.

"I know there's a lot of Shakespeare about this summer but our offering will be around an hour, perambulatory and finished by 7.30pm," says YSP stalwart Maurice Crichton, who is co-directing the walks with Mick Taylor, an actor in last summer's performances, when he took the role of an Army mourner at the Dean's Park memorial.

Sonnet Walks 2018 will set off from York Theatre Royal's café terrace at 6.15pm and 6.30pm tomorrow, Saturday and next Tuesday to Saturday, complemented by matinees at 12 noon and 12.15pm each Saturday.

Sonnet walk "veterans" Taylor and Helen Wilson will each guide one walk's route per evening or weekend matinee, leading walkers on a journey around "the byways of York city centre to encounter colourful characters from present-day York, each with a story to share as they performing some of Shakespeare's most loved verse" at Precentor's Court; Dean's Park, College Green; Bedern Hall; back to College Green and onwards to Stonegate.

Returning to sonneteer duty will be Bill Laverick; Marguerite Moss; Di Starr; Sarah-Jane Strong and Shirley Williams, joined by new additions Nigel Evans; Nick Jones; Emilie Knight; Harry Revell; Erin Wheeler and Frank Brogan, the YSP founder who has not been involved in the project to perform all Shakespeare's plays in a 20-year cycle since the 2006 production of King John.

"Shakespeare's sonnets can be quite difficult to take on board at one read or one listen, as they're highly wrought with complex rhyme schemes, but I think of them as jewels of Elizabethan verse that you need to ponder for some time," says Maurice.

"They were written for reading as manuscripts, so they're difficult to get as 'dramatic pieces' and are difficult to deliver unless you have perfect diction. But if you say, 'who else could speak these sonnets?', then it opens the sonnet up to being about that person, with a bit of a back story about their character.

"Sometimes we have wrestled a sonnet in a direction it's not written for, but we make no apologies for that! We've given our sonneteers the opportunity to choose which sonnet they want to do, which character they want to play, and then put it all together from there."

The Sonnet Walks throw up challenges both in how to perform them and link one to the next, given that the performances are in public spaces and constantly on the move. "The performers have to work out the first point of contact with the people on the walks coming towards them and then also have to decide how to move people on to the next sonnet on the route," says Maurice.

"They also have to get used to delivering sonnets into people's eyes, establishing that eye contact, getting them to engage and join in, which is difficult to pull off when they don't know who's walking towards them and each time they are starting a new show."

The choice of sonnets is not revealed in advance. "Part of the fun of doing a sonnet walk is to discover which sonnets we're doing as you go round, so there's always that element of surprise," says Maurice.

Tickets are available in person from the York Theatre Royal box office, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or on 01904 623568, priced at £6 or £4 for 14 to 17 year olds; two children aged 14 or under may accompany an adult for free.