Description
Book SynopsisThe book examines the presence of medicine matters in Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors, Love’s Labour’s Lost, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merry Wives of Windsor, and documents how the theme of medicine can acquire particular importance for the interpretation of the plays: namely, it matters. Andrea A. Conti provides information on certain aspects of the medical context of the Renaissance, effecting the essential connections with previous and subsequent periods and furnishing the necessary background for the understanding of the state of the art of medicine at the time. Luisa Camaiora presents a close reading of the comedies, and identifies for each a specific and dominant medical facet, then proposed as a structural key for the analysis of the plays. The medical motifs enucleated determine the critical perspective for the discussion of the dramatic characters and events and for the interpretation of the overall meaning and significance of the single works. Features and references related to the sphere of medicine, identified in the comedies, are also commented upon and examined in the context of this medical reading of the plays.
Trade Review«The book as a whole adds meaningful and original insights into Shakespeare’s study.»
(Elisa Fortunato, Le Simplegadi Vol. XV-No. 17 November 2017)
Read the full review here
Table of ContentsLuisa Camaiora/Andrea A. Conti: Premise – Andrea A. Conti: Part I: Some Features of the Renaissance Context – Introduction – Humours and the Body – Pestilences and Diseases – Medical Interventions and Preparations – Practitioners – Institutions, Medical Progress and Health Care – Luisa Camaiora: Part II: A Reading of Five Comedies of Shakespeare – Note on the Chronology of the Comedies – Undifferentiated Diagnoses in The Comedy of Errors: Reliance on Visual Evidence – Logorrhoeic Symptoms in Love’s Labour’s Lost: Indigestion of Words – The Chameleon Syndrome in The Two Gentlemen of Verona: Mutation in Love – Homoeopathic Necessity in The Taming of the Shrew: Interactive Therapy – Tempers and Distempers in The Merry Wives of Windsor: Variable Humours – Bibliography.
