Speech and Performance in Shakespeare's Sonnets and PlaysDavid Schalkwyk offers a sustained reading of Shakespeare's sonnets in relation to his plays. He argues that the language of the sonnets is primarily performative rather than descriptive, and bases this distinction on the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein and J. L. Austin. In a wide-ranging analysis of both the 1609 Quarto of Shakespeare's sonnets and the Petrarchan discourses in a selection of plays, Schalkwyk addresses such issues as embodiment and silencing, interiority and theatricality, inequalities of power, status, gender and desire, both in the published poems and on the stage and in the context of the early modern period. In a provocative discussion of the question of proper names and naming events in the sonnets and plays, the book seeks to reopen the question of the autobiographical nature of Shakespeare's sonnets. |
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Page 3
... young man of birth . The very ' public space ' in which ' writers publi- cized hitherto private bodies and identities , including their own ' ( Bruster , ' Structural Transformation ' , 65 ) contaminates those of high birth who are ...
... young man of birth . The very ' public space ' in which ' writers publi- cized hitherto private bodies and identities , including their own ' ( Bruster , ' Structural Transformation ' , 65 ) contaminates those of high birth who are ...
Page 7
... young man to make him live in their lines by making his image outlast the hardiest of human monuments . How else , we may ask , can this promise 14 Fineman's book remains the most referred - to text in a collection of mostly new essays ...
... young man to make him live in their lines by making his image outlast the hardiest of human monuments . How else , we may ask , can this promise 14 Fineman's book remains the most referred - to text in a collection of mostly new essays ...
Page 8
... young man cannot have dark hair . There is literally very little explicit portraiture in the sonnets to support this assumption . The 1609 Quarto is curiously reticent about indulging in the Petrarchan blazon , despite its repeated ...
... young man cannot have dark hair . There is literally very little explicit portraiture in the sonnets to support this assumption . The 1609 Quarto is curiously reticent about indulging in the Petrarchan blazon , despite its repeated ...
Page 9
... young man's hair.1 The poem as a whole is less concerned with a description of the beloved than in elaborating a ... young man is blond , the other sonnets offer scant information on which to base an identikit . If anything , they coyly ...
... young man's hair.1 The poem as a whole is less concerned with a description of the beloved than in elaborating a ... young man is blond , the other sonnets offer scant information on which to base an identikit . If anything , they coyly ...
Page 11
... Stephen Greenblatt , Walter Cohen , Jean E. Howard and Katherine Eisaman Maus ( London and New York : W. W. Norton , 1997 ) , 865 . Many of Shakespeare's sonnets to the young man attempt to Introduction : the sonnets II.
... Stephen Greenblatt , Walter Cohen , Jean E. Howard and Katherine Eisaman Maus ( London and New York : W. W. Norton , 1997 ) , 865 . Many of Shakespeare's sonnets to the young man attempt to Introduction : the sonnets II.
Contents
1 | |
the sonnets Antony and Cleopatra and As You Like It | 29 |
the sonnets Loves Labours Lost Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night | 59 |
the sonnets Hamlet and King Lear | 102 |
the sonnets Romeo and Juliet Troilus and Cressida and Othello | 150 |
the sonnets and Alls Well that Ends Well | 198 |
Conclusion | 238 |
Bibliography | 243 |
Index | 253 |
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Common terms and phrases
All's anti-theatrical Antony and Cleopatra argues argument audience beauty beloved beloved's Bertram Cambridge character claims concepts context criticism dark lady dark woman declaration Desdemona desire discourse doth early modern embodied enacts erotic Essays eyes fact fair fictional Fineman force Hamlet heart Helen historical Iago ideological illocutionary illocutionary acts interaction interiority inwardness King language games literary logical London loue Love's Labour's Lost lover lyric meaning merely metaphysical mutual Olivia Orsino Othello paradigm paradox performative perlocutionary Petrarchan play player player-poet poem poet poetic poetry political proper name Quarto reciprocity recognise relations relationship render representation rhetorical rigid designation Romeo and Juliet scene self-authorising sense sexual Shakespeare's sonnets silence sonnet 23 sonnet 44 speak speech acts stage theatre theatrical thee thing thou transform Troilus and Cressida truth Twelfth Night University Press Vendler Viola voice vows Wittgenstein women words young