Book Reviews: Ben Jonson in Context, Twelfth Night: New Critical Essays, Cupid in Early Modern Literature and Culture, Shakespeare and Moral Agency, Quoting Death in Early Modern England: The Poetics of Epitaphs beyond the Tomb, Three Renaissance Usury Plays, Thomas Heywood's Theatre, 1599–1639: Locations, Translations, and Conflict, Shakespeare on Stage: Thirteen Leading Actors on Thirteen Key Roles, Shakespeare and the Institution of Theatre: ‘The Best in This Kind’

2011 ◽  
Vol 79 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-124
Author(s):  
Warren Chernaik ◽  
Walter Cannon ◽  
Sarah Carter ◽  
Dana E. Aspinall ◽  
Joseph Sterrett ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Moral Agency ◽  
Ben Jonson ◽  
Early Modern Literature ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
Modern Literature ◽  
Twelfth Night

The Undoing of a Man: Cuckoldry in Heywood's Edward IV

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 246-267
Author(s):  
Jonathan Wright
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Literature ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Modern Literature ◽  
Spiritual Needs ◽  
Critical Reading ◽  
Social Construct

Manhood was a complex social construct in early modern England. Males could not simply mature or grow from boys to men. Instead, they had to assert or prove they were men in multiple ways, such as growing a beard, behaving courageously in battle, exercising self-control in walking, talking, weeping, eating, and drinking, pursuing manly interests, exhibiting manly behaviors, avoiding interests or behaviors typically ascribed to women, marrying a woman and providing for her physical, sexual, and spiritual needs, and living and dying as a faithful Christian. Once a male became a “man” in the eyes of others, his efforts shifted from “making” himself manly to maintaining or defending his reputation as a “true man.” All men could undermine their manhood through their own actions or inactions, but the married man could also lose his reputation through his wife's infidelity. Numerous literary husbands in early modern literature live anxiously with the knowledge they might suffer a cuckold's humiliation and shame. Matthew Shore, who “treasures” his wife to a fault in Thomas Heywood's two-part play Edward IV, is an exceptional example of such a husband. This critical reading of Edward IV explores the complexity of manhood in Heywood's day by showing various males trying to assert or defend their manhood; explaining why husbands had reasons to fear cuckoldry; analyzing how Jane Shore's infidelity affects her husband; following Matthew Shore's journey from trusting husband to distrusting, bitter cuckold, to forgiving husband; and examining his seemingly inexplicable death at the end of the play.

scholarly journals A Historicist and Presentist interpretation of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night

2019 ◽  
pp. 66-78
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Literature ◽  
Modern Literature ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Historical Aspects ◽  
Relevant Today ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
The Way

Historicism and Presentism are two recent, mostly discussed phenomena in the area of Shakespearean studies. While historicists like Stephen Greenblatt argues that historicism pursues historical aspects to explain a text and keeps away present-day political, social and cultural affairs to avoid the misunderstanding of it, the presentists like Terence Hawkes advocates that Presentism offers an unending dialogue between present and past, which is deeply rooted to the present. In addition, Presentism is the re-evaluation of the historical facts upon which our early modern understanding depends. Therefore, Presentism could be an excellent idea to interpret the appropriacy of early modern literature, especially Shakespeare’s oeuvre. This paper, however, elucidates Twelfth Night, one of Shakespeare’s masterpieces, from both historicist and presentist points of view, which looks especially at the way Shakespeare views gender while applying these both approaches. This article also clarifies the reasons for selecting this text for explicating Shakespeare from these two approaches. Finally, this study advocates for combining these two approaches, which might offer a better way to understand Shakespeare’s works and to make him more relevant today.

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