Paradigms Found: Feminist, Gay, and New Historicist Readings of ShakespeareParadigms Found is an indispensable book for students and teachers of Shakespeare, and for anyone interested in the diverse ways in which his plays are read and taught at the start of the twenty-first century. It traces the paradigm shift in Shakespeare studies which, beginning in the 1970s, has foregrounded the playwright's embeddedness in the material practices and ideological constructs of his time, and focussed on the conflicts, gaps and faultlines in early modern society. The book concentrates on feminism and new historicism as the two critical schools that have brought about significant changes in Shakespeare studies, and devotes a chapter to issues in early modern culture and drama highlighted by gay scholars. Topics covered include: contrasting views on the position of Renaissance women, material feminist criticism, Renaissance attacks and defences of women, the maternal body, boy actors, myths of homosexual desire, theatrical transvestism, the role of anecdotes in new historicist practice, self-fashioning, subversion, anxiety and wonder. In tracking the shifting interests of feminist, gay and new historicist critics, Paradigms Found demonstrates the explanatory power of the new approaches, discusses their limitations and places them in the context of developments in society and the academy. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 23
Page 10
... tragedies , and The Winter's Tale among the romances . Early feminist criticism also addressed a question that has lost significance over the years : Shakespeare's hypothetical attitude towards women . As Kenneth Muir , among many ...
... tragedies , and The Winter's Tale among the romances . Early feminist criticism also addressed a question that has lost significance over the years : Shakespeare's hypothetical attitude towards women . As Kenneth Muir , among many ...
Page 14
... plays are framed within a patriarchal order posited as pervasive and a - historical . As far as genre is concerned , the division between women in comedies and in tragedies is foregrounded . If some of the essays show a 14 Paradigms Found.
... plays are framed within a patriarchal order posited as pervasive and a - historical . As far as genre is concerned , the division between women in comedies and in tragedies is foregrounded . If some of the essays show a 14 Paradigms Found.
Page 15
... tragedies has a great deal to do with Cleopatra's central role , especially after the death of Antony in Act 4. The argument , sometimes advanced , that sexual passion is not a suitable tragic theme is not applied , as Fitz observes ...
... tragedies has a great deal to do with Cleopatra's central role , especially after the death of Antony in Act 4. The argument , sometimes advanced , that sexual passion is not a suitable tragic theme is not applied , as Fitz observes ...
Page 16
... tragedy privileged by feminist criticism . Neely's premise is that the theme of Othello is married love , and the central conflict , that between men and women . Through close readings of the play , she studies the behaviour of the ...
... tragedy privileged by feminist criticism . Neely's premise is that the theme of Othello is married love , and the central conflict , that between men and women . Through close readings of the play , she studies the behaviour of the ...
Page 17
... tragedy discloses several expressions which reveal Othello's guilt and sexual anxiety , so that " the language suggests that Desdemona is a ' strumpet ' not so much because of her imagined infidelity as because of her sexual allure and ...
... tragedy discloses several expressions which reveal Othello's guilt and sexual anxiety , so that " the language suggests that Desdemona is a ' strumpet ' not so much because of her imagined infidelity as because of her sexual allure and ...
Contents
5 | |
9 | |
The Turn to History in Feminist Studies | 23 |
Maternal Subtexts | 43 |
Gay Interventions | 53 |
The Critic as StoryTeller | 71 |
The Pastoral of Power | 83 |
Social Energy and Renaissance Drama | 99 |
The Contest of Paradigms | 127 |
145 | |
155 | |
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Paradigms Found: Feminist, Gay, and New Historicist Readings of Shakespeare Pilar Hidalgo Limited preview - 2021 |
Common terms and phrases
Adelman analysis anecdote anti-theatrical pamphlets Antony and Cleopatra anxiety arguments Barroll boy actor central century chapter comedies concept contemporary context criticism of Shakespeare critique cross-dressing cultural Desdemona discourse Dusinberre Dusinberre's E. M. W. Tillyard early modern Elizabethan Emphasis England English Literary Renaissance essay European fantasy female characters femininity feminism feminist criticism formal controversy genre Goldberg Grady Greenblatt Hamlet Henry heterosexual historical historicism historicist homoerotic homosexual Howard Iago identity ideological Invisible Bullets issue Jardine King Lear Levin male friendship Marlowe Marlowe's marriage masculine material materialist McLuskie misogynistic misogyny Montrose mother Neely Norton Orgel Othello paradigm pastoral perceives perspective playwright political position present privileged psychoanalytic Queen radical reading reification relationship Renaissance drama Renaissance literature Renaissance Self-Fashioning Renaissance studies role scholars sexuality Shakespeare Shakespeare's plays social sodomy Spenser stage subversion textual theatre theatrical theory traditional tragedies transvestism transvestite transvestite women Troilus and Cressida Twelfth Night woman Woodbridge
Popular passages
Page 16 - Twere now to be most happy, for I fear My soul hath her content so absolute That not another comfort like to this Succeeds in unknown fate.