Local and Global Myths in Shakespearean Performance

Description

This collection of scholarly essays offers a new understanding of local and global myths that have been constructed around Shakespeare in theatre, cinema, and television from the nineteenth century to the present. Drawing on a definition of myth as a powerful ideological narrative, Local and Global Myths in Shakespearean Performance examines historical, political, and cultural conditions of Shakespearean performances in Europe, Asia, and North and South America. The first part of this volume offers a theoretical introduction to Shakespeare as myth from a twenty-first century perspective. The second part critically evaluates myths of linguistic transcendence, authenticity, and universality within broader European, neo-liberal, and post-colonial contexts. The study of local identities and global icons in the third part uncovers dynamic relationships between regional, national, and transnational myths of Shakespeare. The fourth part revises persistent narratives concerning a political potential of Shakespeare’s plays in communist and post-communist countries. Finally, part five explores the influence of commercial and popular culture on Shakespeare myths. Michael Dobson’s Afterword concludes the volume by locating Shakespeare within classical mythology and contemporary concerns. Front Matter ....Pages i-xix Introduction (Alexa Alice Joubin, Aneta Mancewicz)....Pages 1-21 Front Matter ....Pages 23-23 “Europe Speaks Shakespeare”: Karin Beier’s 1996 A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Multilingual Performance and the Myth of Shakespeare’s Linguistic Transcendence (Bettina Boecker)....Pages 25-39 The Myth of Shakespearean Authenticity: Neoliberalism and Humanistic Shakespeare (Marcela Kostihova)....Pages 41-55 Shamanistic Shakespeare: Korea’s Colonization of Hamlet (Kevin A. Quarmby)....Pages 57-73 Front Matter ....Pages 75-75 Ludwig Tieck and the Development of the Romantic Myth of a “German Shakespeare” (Dan Venning)....Pages 77-92 Shakespeare Beyond the Trenches: The German Myth of unser Shakespeare in Transnational Perspective (Benedict Schofield)....Pages 93-119 “Tupi or Not Tupi, That Is the Question”: Brazilian Mythical Afterlives of Shakespeare’s Hamlet (Anna Stegh Camati)....Pages 121-136 Front Matter ....Pages 137-137 Hamlet and the Fall of the Berlin Wall: The Myth of Interventionist Shakespeare Performance (Emily Oliver)....Pages 139-154 Denmark’s a Prison: Appropriating Modern Myths of Hamlet After 1989 in Lin Zhaohua’s Hamulaite and Jan Klata’s H. (Saffron Vickers Walkling)....Pages 155-171 Hamlet in Times of War: Two Appropriations of Shakespeare’s Tragedy in Former Yugoslavia in the 1990s (Alexandra Portmann)....Pages 173-187 “Come, Let’s Away to Prison”: Local and Global Myths, and “Political Shakespeare” in Twenty-First-Century Russia (Aleksandra Sakowska)....Pages 189-209 Front Matter ....Pages 211-211 Localizing a Global Myth: Contemporary Film Adaptations of King Lear (Kinga Földváry)....Pages 213-227 Shakespeare Sanitized for the Present: Political Myths in Recent Adaptations (Frank Widar Brevik)....Pages 229-243 The Myths of Bold Visual and Conservative Verbal Interpretations of Shakespeare on Today’s Japanese Stage (Ryuta Minami)....Pages 245-258 Afterword: Shakespeare and Myth (Michael Dobson)....Pages 259-265 Back Matter ....Pages 267-271