Knowing Shakespeare
Subtitle: senses, embodiment and cognition
By: edited by Lowell Gallagher and Shankar Raman
Series: Palgrave Shakespeare studies; Palgrave Shakespeare studies
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire; New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 270
ISBN-13: 9780230275614
Subjects: Criticism and interpretation; Senses and sensation in literature
Description: Knowing Shakespeare describes the rich variance of embodied and sensory perception in early modern culture. The volume's cross-disciplinary emphasis enhances understanding of the 'sense' of sensing in Shakespeare's idiom by bringing schemes from early modern natural philosophy and rhetorical arts into critical conversation with concepts drawn from historical phenomenology, cognitive science and trauma theory. Collectively the essays, many of which are written by leading Shakespeare scholars, detail the range of issues; social, political, ethical, and aesthetic--to be found in the theatrical performance of diverse and sometimes competing languages and gestures of embodied, sensory perception on Shakespeare's stage. An important investment of many of the essays is to demonstrate how neglected legacies of philosophical scepticism and materialist developments in phenomenological thought shed light on the performative range of gender as embodied and voiced in Shakespeare's dramaturgy. The scope of the volume thus presents a timely survey of recent and innovative thinking about the critical role of the senses in Shakespeare.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 241-256) and index.
Table of contents: title: Macbeth and the perils of conjecture / Sean H. McDowell; title: Eying and wording in Cymbeline / Bruce R. Smith; title: 'O, she's warm': touch in The winter's tale / Evelyn Tribble; title: Falling into extremity / Patricia Cahill; title: Roman world, Egyptian earth: cognitive difference in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra / Mary Thomas Crane; title: Hamlet in motion / Shankar Raman; title: Artifactual knowledge in Hamlet / Howard Marchitello; title: 'Rich eyes and poor hands': theaters of early modern experience / Adam Rzepka; title: 'Repeat to me the words of the echo': listening to The tempest / Allison Kay Deutermann; title: Mind the gaps: the ear, the eye, and the senses of a woman in Much ado about nothing / Diana E. Henderson.