Description
Book SynopsisLike the artists studied here, we pick and choose our Shakespeares, and through that labor another story emerges. Frozen in time on the page or screen, some of those collaborations continue to speak, but denuded of their immediate moment and surroundings; we are left to supplement the traces. In recovering that past, the present takes on greater clarity and contrast. But the proof must be in the telling. A writer lifts a pen. Enter the multiple forcespolitical and economic, psychological, formal, and technicalthat serendipitously transform imagination into memory. Let the collaborative play begin.from the Introduction
Focusing on key writers, actors, theater directors, and filmmakers who have kept Shakespeare at the center of their endeavors over the past two hundred years, Collaborations with the Past illuminates not only the playwright''s work but also the choices and responsibilities involved in re-creating culture, and the ingenuity and peril of the artistic process
Trade Review
Collaborations with the Past is a thought-provoking analysis of Shakespeare's role in key periods of English cultural history, from the Romantics, represented by Sir Walter Scott, through to present-day film, television, and stage productions of The Taming of the Shrew and Henry V.
* Review of English Studies *
The most probing and productive collaborations with Shakespeare, the English past, and the 'woman's part’ recorded in these pages are arguably those undertaken by Diana E. Henderson herself, in a performance made the more compelling by the unusual blend of intelligence and sheer scholarly panache with which it is tendered.
* Comparative Drama *
Table of ContentsShake-shifting: An IntroductionPart One: Novel Transformations1. Bards of the Borders: Scott's Kenilworth, the Nineteenth Century’s Shakespeare, and the Tragedy of Othello2. A Fine Romance: Cymbeline, [Jane Eyre], and Mrs. DallowayPart Two: Media Crossings3. The Return of the Shrew: New Media, Old Stories, and Shakespearean Comedy4. What’s Past Is Prologue: Shakespeare’s History and the Modern Performance of Henry VBibliography
Index
