Circumstantial Shakespeare / Lorna Hutson.

By:

Hutson, Lorna [author.]

Material type: Text

TextSeries: Oxford Wells Shakespeare lecturesPublisher: Oxford, United Kingdom : Oxford University Press, 2015Description: x, 190 pages ; 20 cmISBN:

9780198816393

Subject(s):

Genre/Form:

DDC classification:

822.33 HUT

Online resources:

Table of contents only

Contents:

Introduction -- 'Quando?' (When?) in Romeo and Juliet -- 'Imaginary Work': Opportunity in Lucrece and in King Lear -- Where and How? Two Gentlemen of Verona and The Maid's Tragedy -- 'The Innocent Sleepe': Motive in Macbeth.

Summary: Shakespeare's characters are thought to be his greatest achievement-imaginatively autonomous, possessed of depth and individuality, while his plots are said to be second-hand and careless of details of time and place. This view has survived the assaults of various literary theories and has even, surprisingly, been revitalized by the recent emphasis on the collaborative nature of early modern theatre. But belief in the autonomous imaginative life of Shakespeare's characters depends on another unexamined myth: the myth that Shakespeare rejected neoclassicism, playing freely with theatrical time and place. Circumstantial Shakespeare explodes these venerable critical commonplaces. Drawing on sixteenth-century rhetorical pedagogy, it reveals the importance of topics of circumstance (of Time, Place and Motive, etc.) in the conjuring of compelling narratives and vivid mental images. 'Circumstances'-which we now think of as incalculable contingencies-were originally topics of forensic inquiry into human intention or passion. In drawing on the Roman forensic tradition of circumstantial proof, Shakespeare did not ignore time and place-- Page 4 of cover.

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Holdings
Item type	Current library	Collection	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode
Books	H.T. Parekh Library	SIAS Collection	822.33 HUT (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		K3085

GBP 15.99
TRP40/47

Includes bibliographical references (pages 173-183) and index.

Shakespeare's characters are thought to be his greatest achievement-imaginatively autonomous, possessed of depth and individuality, while his plots are said to be second-hand and careless of details of time and place. This view has survived the assaults of various literary theories and has even, surprisingly, been revitalized by the recent emphasis on the collaborative nature of early modern theatre. But belief in the autonomous imaginative life of Shakespeare's characters depends on another unexamined myth: the myth that Shakespeare rejected neoclassicism, playing freely with theatrical time and place. Circumstantial Shakespeare explodes these venerable critical commonplaces. Drawing on sixteenth-century rhetorical pedagogy, it reveals the importance of topics of circumstance (of Time, Place and Motive, etc.) in the conjuring of compelling narratives and vivid mental images. 'Circumstances'-which we now think of as incalculable contingencies-were originally topics of forensic inquiry into human intention or passion. In drawing on the Roman forensic tradition of circumstantial proof, Shakespeare did not ignore time and place-- Page 4 of cover.

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