The Use and Abuse of Shakespeare: A Review Essay (original) (raw)
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The new Cambridge companion to Shakespeare
2010
Written by a team of leading international scholars, this Companion is designed to illuminate Shakespeare's works through discussion of the key topics of Shakespeare studies. Twenty-one brand new essays provide lively and authoritative approaches to recent scholarship and criticism for readers keen to expand their knowledge and appreciation of Shakespeare. The book contains stimulating chapters on traditional topics such as Shakespeare's biography and the transmission of his texts. Individual readings of the plays are given in the context of genre as well as through the cultural and historical perspectives of race, sexuality and gender, and politics and religion. Essays on performance survey the latest digital media as well as stage and fi lm. Throughout the volume, contributors discuss Shakespeare's long and constantly mutating history of reception and performance in both national and global contexts. margreta de grazia is the Sheli Z. and Burt X. Rosenberg Chair in the Humanities and Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of Shakespeare Verbatim (1991) and 'Hamlet' without Hamlet (2007). She has also co-edited Subject and Object in Renaissance Culture (1996) with Maureen Quilligan and Peter Stallybrass.
International Journal of English Studies
In the last few years there has been an increased interest within the field of Shakespeare studies in criticism. The 400 th anniversary of Shakespeare's death was celebrated with the publication of Shakespeare in Our Time. A Shakespeare Association of America Collection (Callaghan & Gossett, 2016). This varied collection of essays, mostly written by former SAA presidents, examines key concerns and new critical approaches in the ever-growing field of Shakespeare studies. More recently, The Arden Shakespeare released The Arden Research Handbook of Contemporary Shakespeare Criticism (Gajowski, 2020), twenty chapters that provide a general overview of the most influential theoretical trends in Shakespearean criticism from the mid-twentieth century until the present. Unlike the aforementioned studies in Critical Approaches to Shakespeare (1623-2000). Shakespeare for All Time (2022) Marta Cerezo Moreno does not offer a general overview, but instead an in-depth analysis of the main critical currents that dominated Shakespeare studies during the last four centuries. To acquire a better understanding of Shakespeare in our time, one ought to look first at the historical schools of thought that have strongly influenced and, also, served as the basis for contemporary Shakespeare criticism. This is precisely the reason why Critical Approaches to Shakespeare (1623-2000). Shakespeare for All Time constitutes a valuable contribution to
International Journal of English Studies, 2023
In the last few years there has been an increased interest within the field of Shakespeare studies in criticism. The 400 th anniversary of Shakespeare's death was celebrated with the publication of Shakespeare in Our Time. A Shakespeare Association of America Collection (Callaghan & Gossett, 2016). This varied collection of essays, mostly written by former SAA presidents, examines key concerns and new critical approaches in the ever-growing field of Shakespeare studies. More recently, The Arden Shakespeare released The Arden Research Handbook of Contemporary Shakespeare Criticism (Gajowski, 2020), twenty chapters that provide a general overview of the most influential theoretical trends in Shakespearean criticism from the mid-twentieth century until the present. Unlike the aforementioned studies in Critical Approaches to Shakespeare (1623-2000). Shakespeare for All Time (2022) Marta Cerezo Moreno does not offer a general overview, but instead an in-depth analysis of the main critical currents that dominated Shakespeare studies during the last four centuries. To acquire a better understanding of Shakespeare in our time, one ought to look first at the historical schools of thought that have strongly influenced and, also, served as the basis for contemporary Shakespeare criticism. This is precisely the reason why Critical Approaches to Shakespeare (1623-2000). Shakespeare for All Time constitutes a valuable contribution to
Cultural Shakespeare: Essays in the Shakespeare Myth
Notes and Queries, 2002
The two terms of this book's title-'culture' and 'myth'-map the territory of its contents, which span more or less a decade of work (1984-94) in a particular area of Shakespeare studies. The subtitle derives from a collection of essays by various hands, published in 1988 as The Shakespeare Myth. The term 'myth' was derived from Roland Barthes' Mythologies i was an attempt to identify a powerful cultural institution, constructed around the figure of Shakespeare, that could be analysed to some degree separately from the person of the Elizabethan dramatist, and the texts of his works. Traditional Shakespeare criticism, as it is still very widely practised, consists of reading and interpreting the plays and poems; seeking to unlock their intrinsic meanings by reference to the author's assumed 'intentions' or to the historical context in which he wrote; analysing the plays in relation to their origins in the Elizabethan theatre and so on. The Shakespeare Myth sought a different approach:
SEDERI Yearbook 32, 2022
A handbook is a compilation of established knowledge on a given topic. De iure, none of the essays contained in a handbook need to provide new research output; de facto, we have expectations for a handbook on Shakespearean criticism (setting aside our professional need to be served with an impeccable state of the art). Regarding state of the art, this volume passes the test with flying colors. But a challenge to be faced by a handbook's editor is to decide on the vantage point from which the abovementioned established knowledge should be organized. In "Introduction: Twenty-First Century Shakespeares" (1-18), Evelyn Gajowski alludes to a wellknown nostalgia for the Shakespeare that, she suggests, resembles that teddy bear from our childhood-a memento from a fixed, stable and comfortable past. A number of studies have, of course, challenged the interest of this fixed, comfy, and foundational Shakespeare. Rather than reformulating this challenge to traditional perspectives (whether in private rooms or classrooms), the volume reminds us that, at least in academia, traditional approaches to Shakespeare were never meant to be traditional. Disciplines such as New Criticism, Formalism, and Character Analysis once constituted vigorous and fresh perspectives. Crucially, I find that the volume shows that, after all, these are still vigorous and fresh perspectives and that new ones would not have come to the academic arena if not preceded by them. The essays show that "Foundational studies," "Challenges to traditional liberal humanism," "Matters of difference," "Millennial directions," and "Twenty-First Century directions"-the sections into which the book is divided-are applicable, fertile, productive, and, importantly, mutually enriching. One of the book's strengths is its structure: a stage-by-stage explanation of the succession of approaches to Shakespeare which
Actes des congrès de la Société française Shakespeare , 2022
Shakespeare adaptations share an intimate relation with global studies, because Shakespeare – as a cultural institution – registers a broad spectrum of practices that generate productive dialogues with world cultures. Global studies enables us to examine deceivingly harmonious images of Shakespeare’s works. This paper examines culturally fluid, contemporary adaptations in relation to digital cultures. Mining rhizomatic and non-linear flows of tropes, my approach evaluates the connections among Saudi, Bollywood, and French New Wave films. ::::: The second part of this paper traces global Shakespeares during the outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020. While the global pandemic closed live theatre events and cinemas worldwide, it also ushered in a new phase of globalization fuelled by on-demand digital videos as at-home audiences took to streaming to engage with Shakespeare. In tandem with the spread of coronavirus, there is a global viral spread of Shakespeare that carries site-specific meanings with them in disembodied forms. ::::: Delineating the relations between Shakespeare and global studies in adaptations and in digital culture, this paper outlines the future challenges and opportunities for the fields. ::::: Résumés francais : Les adaptations de Shakespeare entretiennent un lien privilégié avec les études de la mondialisation, car Shakespeare, en tant qu’institution culturelle, recouvre un large éventail de pratiques qui génèrent des dialogues productifs avec les cultures du monde. Les études mondiales nous permettent d’examiner une certaine image, trop simpliste, des œuvres de Shakespeare. Grâce aux méthodologies rhizomatiques de Deleuze et Guattari, cet article analyse les adaptations contemporaines et les met en vis-à-vis avec les cultures numériques. En explorant les connexions non linéaires entre les cultures, mon approche approfondit les liens entre les films saoudiens, les films bollywoodiens et les films français de la Nouvelle Vague. La deuxième partie de cet article parcourt les adaptations internationales de Shakespeare durant l'épidémie de COVID-19 au début de l'année 2020. Alors que la pandémie a conduit à la fermeture des salles de cinéma et l’arrêt des représentations théâtrales non virtuelles dans le monde entier, elle a également inauguré une nouvelle phase de mondialisation alimentée par un circuit de vidéos à la demande, que les spectateurs ont adopté afin d’entretenir leur passion pour Shakespeare. Parallèlement à la propagation du coronavirus, on a pu observer une propagation virale mondiale de Shakespeare à travers des flux numériques qui apportent un nouveau sens en dépit d’une forme désincarnée. En juxtaposant les contextes culturels et la portée locale de trois films avec l’émergence de significations numériques inédites, cet article décrit les futurs défis et opportunités qui se profilent pour Shakespeare et les études de la mondialisation. ::::: https://journals.openedition.org/shakespeare/7040
Alicante Journal of English Studies 25(2012): 19-32 Shakespeare: Revising and Re-visioning
2016
This article engages with one of the current critical and bibliographical concerns of Shakespeare studies: the collaborative nature of Shakespeare’s work. Bibliographers have identified other hands in the fabric of Shakespeare’s plays. Here the focus is Shakespeare’s collaboration in the plays of others. Three such instances will be examined; The Book of Sir Thomas More, The Spanish Tragedy and The Chronicle History of King Lear. Substantially different as these cases may be, in all of them Shakespeare is working with the materials of others. Shakespeare’s King Lear is an adaptation of the older Leir play performed by the Queen’s Men and in that sense it is a deeply collaborative work. As this essay concludes, without a model there would be nothing to stimulate, or provoke or exceed. One of the major developments in the study of early modern drama over the past two decades has been an increased focus on the collaborative processes through which plays are brought to the public.1 Inst...