Shakespeare the Actor and the Purposes of PlayingFor the Renaissance, all the world may have been a stage and all its people players, but Shakespeare was also an actor on the literal stage. Meredith Anne Skura asks what it meant to be an actor in Shakespeare's England and shows why a knowledge of actual theatrical practices is essential for understanding both Shakespeare's plays and the theatricality of everyday life in early modern England. Despite the obvious differences between our theater and Shakespeare's, sixteenth-century testimony suggests that the experience of acting has not changed much over the centuries. Beginning with a psychoanalytically informed account of acting today, Skura shows how this intense and ambivalent experience appears not only in literal references to acting in Shakespearean drama but also in recurring narrative concerns, details of language, and dramatic strategies used to engage the audience. Looking at the plays in the context of both public and private worlds outside the theater, Skura rereads the canon to identify new configurations in the plays and new ways of understanding theatrical self-consciousness in Renaissance England. Rich in theatrical, psychoanalytic, biographical, and historical insight, this book will be invaluable to students of Shakespeare and instructive to all readers interested in the dynamics of performance. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 46
Page xi
... means for the actor to make contact with his audience ( Weimann , Michael Goldman , David Wiles ) . The latter studies once fo- cused on the audience's engagement in or detachment from the illusion created by the play ( Maynard Mack ) ...
... means for the actor to make contact with his audience ( Weimann , Michael Goldman , David Wiles ) . The latter studies once fo- cused on the audience's engagement in or detachment from the illusion created by the play ( Maynard Mack ) ...
Page 1
... means the obvious career for the son of a former Stratford bailiff with a family of four to support . Even after he established himself as a play- wright , Shakespeare chose to remain a player — unlike Anthony Munday or Ben Jonson , who ...
... means the obvious career for the son of a former Stratford bailiff with a family of four to support . Even after he established himself as a play- wright , Shakespeare chose to remain a player — unlike Anthony Munday or Ben Jonson , who ...
Page 2
... Robert Wilson , Anthony Munday , Ben Jonson , Thomas Heywood , Nathan Field , Robert Armin , Samuel and William Rowley , Richard Brome , and , of course , Wil- liam Shakespeare . These texts are by no means a 2 Introduction.
... Robert Wilson , Anthony Munday , Ben Jonson , Thomas Heywood , Nathan Field , Robert Armin , Samuel and William Rowley , Richard Brome , and , of course , Wil- liam Shakespeare . These texts are by no means a 2 Introduction.
Page 3
... means " about " acting at every moment discussed here . But as Goldman says , everything Shakespeare wrote " reflects his dramatic bent ... because it shows us a response to life for which drama was finally neces- sary . " 10 Similarly ...
... means " about " acting at every moment discussed here . But as Goldman says , everything Shakespeare wrote " reflects his dramatic bent ... because it shows us a response to life for which drama was finally neces- sary . " 10 Similarly ...
Page 5
... means all the way , to speaking in his own voice . The second part of the book considers Shakespeare's presentation of act- ing in the rest of the canon . Just as Shakespeare's life can be illuminated by reading it against that of the ...
... means all the way , to speaking in his own voice . The second part of the book considers Shakespeare's presentation of act- ing in the rest of the canon . Just as Shakespeare's life can be illuminated by reading it against that of the ...
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Common terms and phrases
Actaeon acting Anne Antony Arden Armado attack audience audience's baiting Barber and Wheeler bearbaiting beggar Bottom Brutus Caesar called Callow chapter character child cited in Chambers clown Comedy Coriolanus crowd crown death deer describes Drama dream Elizabethan Stage English Epilogue Fairy Falstaff fantasies father fawning fear flattering fool Hal's Hamlet Henriad Henry Henry IV Henry VI Histriomastix histrionic hunt identified inner plays italics added John John Marston Jonson King King Lear kneel Launce Lear literally London Lord Love's Labour's Lost male Midsummer Night's Dream mirror mother murder narcissistic offstage onstage performance play's players poet Queen Renaissance Richard Richard III role says scene Shake Shakespeare shame Shrew Sly's social sonnet speare's stage fright story suggests Tarlton tells theater theatrical thee Thomas thou Timon Timon of Athens Titus Titus Andronicus University Press Wives wounds York