Shakespeare in Performance

by Robert Shaughnessy (Editor), Michael D. Bristol (Editor)

This collection stages the debates between theory and practice that have transformed our understanding of Shakespeare in performance in recent years. Drawing upon textual theory, materialist cultural criticism, new historicism, feminism, postcolonialism, and psychoanalysis, the essays address Shakespeare's plays as texts in and for performance in a variety of contexts, ranging from the Renaissance to the present. The collection not only offers readers new ways of thinking about Shakespeare in the theatre, but also highlights the practical and theoretical potential of performance itself as a means of redefining Shakespeare in contemporary culture.

246 pages, Hardcover

First published June 30, 2000

Reviews

[Candy Wood]

Compiled in 2000, this collection contains pieces that were previously published elsewhere and all predate the reconstructed Globe on Bankside, though Shaughnessy’s introduction misleadingly refers to the theatre’s 1997 opening. J. L. Styan’s chapter on performance spaces, first published in 1989, even expresses a hope that a Globe replica would be built to test his ideas about the degree of illusion that might have been expected of Shakespeare’s first playgoers. While some of the writers have subsequently written about the Globe, this collection’s contribution is to locate them in relation to earlier ideas about performance. As part of the Casebooks series, it includes brief summaries of each piece and a list of further reading, and it could still be useful to students, giving them a taste of the full books each of the writers has produced.