scholarly journals Identity in Shakespeare

2012 ◽  
pp. 33
Author(s):  
Jay L. Halio
Keyword(s):  
King Lear ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Romeo And Juliet ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Her Family ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Course Of Action ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
Antic Disposition

This paper surveys the problems of identity in a number of Shakespeare’s plays, such as The Taming of the Shrew, The Comedy of Errors, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Othello. In these plays as in many others, Shakespeare explores the complexity of identity, not only through the use of disguise, as in the major comedies, but also through the problems of self-knowledge. The latter issue is prominent and explicit in King Lear when, for example, Lear asks “Who is it that can tell me who I am?” The opening words of Hamlet, “Who’s there?” introduce the problem from the outset, and much of the play is given over to characters trying to discover who the others in the play really are. Is the Ghost an honest ghost, or “a goblin damned?” Is Hamlet really mad or just putting on an “antic disposition” as he struggles to discover his proper course of action as his father’s avenger? Is Kate really a shrew, or just made to act like one by her family and others?

Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; The Merchant of Venice. Edited by Charles Edelman. $65 cloth; Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; The Taming of the Shrew. Edited by Elizabeth Schafer. $65 cloth; Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; King Henry V. Edited by Emma Smith. $23 paper.

2004 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 158-161
Author(s):  
Michael Flachmann
Keyword(s):  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Romeo And Juliet ◽  
Henry V ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Tempest ◽  
As You Like It

In their “Editors' Preface” to the Cambridge University Press Shakespeare in Production series, J. S. Bratton and Julie Hankey proudly describe the “comprehensive dossier of materials,” including “eye-witness accounts, contemporary criticism, promptbook marginalia, stage business, cuts, additions and rewritings,” that make up the heart of this brilliant and exceptionally useful collection of Shakespeare editions. Conceived by Jeremy Treglown and first published by Junction Books, the series was later printed by Bristol Classical Press as Plays in Performance, though none of the original four titles remains in print. Already published in the descendant Cambridge Shakespeare in Production series are nine plays—A Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado about Nothing, Antony and Cleopatra, Hamlet, The Tempest, King Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice—with Macbeth, Twelfth Night, Troilus and Cressida, Othello, and As You Like It forthcoming.

scholarly journals Deconstruction of the Construction: Derridean Study of Selected Shakespeare’s Comedies

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 90-120
Author(s):  
Seyyedeh Zahra Nozen ◽  
Pegah Sheikhalipour
Keyword(s):  
William Shakespeare ◽  
The Other ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Norms ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Historical Figure ◽  
The One

Since it was first introduced by Jacques Derrida in the late 1960s, deconstruction, as a method of reading, has been applied to literary texts by critics to reveal the hidden messages of texts and provide opportunities to rethink textual and cultural norms and conventions. While the western tradition has always prioritized tragedy over comedy due to its elegance and graveness, this research tends to focus on comedy as an entity in itself. Tragedy, especially in the Shakespearean sense of the word, has been considered by critics as a “construction” that is well-wrought and perfect in nature. Comedy, on the other hand, is notable for laughing at the laughable and mocking the unfit. Put differently, there has always been a latent, freewheeling “deconstruction” within comedy, especially the Shakespearean. There is, thus, an attempt here to prove, on the one hand, how comedy can be put forth not as an inferior genre but as a supplement to tragedy and, on the other, how comedy moves toward deconstruction and how it tends to subvert or deconstruct the constructions. Investigating a selection of Shakespeare’s comedies including As You Like It, The Merchant of Venice, and Twelfth Night, this study compares and contrasts Shakespearean comedy in light of some Derridean concepts. Along with it, Shakespearean ideas and concepts which are interconnected with those of Derrida are introduced and are buttressed through some meticulously chosen excerpts. Bearing in mind that Derrida is in a habit of deconstructing the so-called established creeds, Shakespeare’s texts are exposed to a deconstructive reading to examine how deceptively simple ideas are dealt with in his selected comedies. Also, as numerous enigmas have for years revolved around the personality of William Shakespeare, this study also aims to take up certain critical idioms of the Derridean canon, elaborate on them and then relate them to the selected plays from the Shakespearean oeuvre in order to disclose some personal aspects of Shakespeare’s personality as a historical figure.

Gender and Genre

2018 ◽  
pp. 327-341
Author(s):  
Michelle M. Dowd
Keyword(s):  
Lived Experience ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Female Agency ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Material Conditions ◽  
Historical Moment

This chapter addresses the prevalence of strong female characters in Shakespeare’s comedies, situating them within recent scholarship on the multidimensional status, agency, and lived experience of Englishwomen of different social classes. In particular, the chapter considers female agency in the comedies through the lens of new materialist approaches to Shakespeare and gender. Attending to such materialist concerns as inheritance, property ownership, and domestic management helps illuminate the specific forms of female authority that are enabled and disabled in the comedies. Analysing selected comedies, notably Twelfth Night, The Merchant of Venice, As You Like It, and The Two Gentlemen of Verona, this chapter argues that the perceived ‘strength’ of many of Shakespeare’s comic heroines is complexly interwoven with the material conditions of their historical moment.

scholarly journals Shakespeare Comes to Indonesia

2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (25) ◽  
pp. 99-119
Author(s):  
Michael Skupin
Keyword(s):  
King Lear ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Indirect Influence ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Dutch Translation ◽  
A Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Lengthy Discussion

This paper discusses the circumstances of Shakespeare’s arrival in Indonesia via the translations of Trisno Sumardjo, published in the early 1950’s. Biographical material about the translator will be presented, and there will be a discussion of the characteristics the Indonesian language and of Indonesian verse which would determine the expectations of his readers, such as rhyme, meter and style, that would influence his renderings of the poetic passages in the Bard’s plays. These are illustrated in a sampling of passages from As You Like It, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth and The Merchant of Venice. The Dutch translation of L. A. J. Burgersdijk was an indirect influence on the translations, and not always for the good. The paper concludes with a lengthy discussion of the extremely difficult problems that Sumardjo encountered in his translation of King Lear. This Lear was not published during the translator’s lifetime, Sumardjo’s prestige notwithstanding because he was not satisfied with the solutions he proposed.

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