The Absent ShakespeareBuilding on recent textual studies of King Lear and Hamlet, which compare Folio and Quarto differences, Mirsky sees them not just as an opportunity to view the playwright revising toward more skillful staging, greater complexity of plot, and ambiguity of character. The process of revision also exposes a personal Shakespeare. Differences between Folio and Quarto texts show the growing sophistication of Shakespeare's dramatic craft and reveal how the playwright changed as he matured. The book presents a dramatist maturing in time, grappling with incest, patricide, filicide, erotic love, and the inevitability of death. It finds this naked Shakespeare in Macbeth and The Tempest as well, expressed in the riddles of the plays. The author refers not only to the text of Shakespeare but also to the plays in performance - suggesting how the actor's reading and interpretation lay bare the intentions of the playwright on the stage. |
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Page 28
... spirit I know . . . " ( FF . 4.7 : 2795-96 , 2799 ) . If indeed " the great rage . . . is kill'd in him " as the attendant reports , and the ethereal has replaced lust in the King's imagination , the root of selfishness remains . His ...
... spirit I know . . . " ( FF . 4.7 : 2795-96 , 2799 ) . If indeed " the great rage . . . is kill'd in him " as the attendant reports , and the ethereal has replaced lust in the King's imagination , the root of selfishness remains . His ...
Page 30
... spirit in the other world , rising . Olivier's Lear sinks down on Cordelia's breast in an incestuous last embrace . I would set this possibility aside . In fact , Shakespeare seems to have left a clear description of how Lear's death ...
... spirit in the other world , rising . Olivier's Lear sinks down on Cordelia's breast in an incestuous last embrace . I would set this possibility aside . In fact , Shakespeare seems to have left a clear description of how Lear's death ...
Page 31
... spirit , to bring her back into this world from the other , to breathe life into the body . He dies in the supreme effort to raise the dead — and one is never sure whether he feels her for an instant coming back to life , or sees her spirit ...
... spirit , to bring her back into this world from the other , to breathe life into the body . He dies in the supreme effort to raise the dead — and one is never sure whether he feels her for an instant coming back to life , or sees her spirit ...
Page 51
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Page 53
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Contents
15 | |
19 | |
The Itch Revises | 33 |
Hamlets Father | 47 |
The Shadows Dance | 71 |
Macbeths Child | 99 |
What Prospero Knows | 125 |
Shakespeares Myth | 141 |
Notes | 147 |
Works Cited | 169 |
Index | 172 |
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Common terms and phrases
action actor Alfred Harbage ambition anger anxiety audience Banquo begins Caliban calls child Claudius Claudius's conscience Cordelia court cries dark daughter dead death doth drama dream echo Edgar Edited Edmund erotic evil fantasy father fear Ferdinand flesh Folio Fool foul Gertrude Gertrude's Ghost Gloucester Gloucester's Gonerill grave Hamlet hath hear Heaven Hesiod Horatio husband incestuous innocent joke King Lear King's Lady Macbeth Laertes Laertes's latter Lear's lines look Lord Macduff madness magic mind Miranda mock mole mother murder nature never Oedipus Ophelia Osric Pillicock play playwright plot Polonius Prince Prince Hamlet Prince's Prospero question reality reference Regan remark revenge riddle scene Second Quarto seems sense sexual Shake Shakespeare sisters sleep soliloquy Sophocles speaks speech stage suggests suicide T. S. Eliot Tempest thee thou tion tragedy Urkowitz W. W. Greg wife William Shakespeare witches word
Popular passages
Page 50 - In the most high and palmy state of Rome, A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets...
Page 37 - Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave My heart into my mouth. I love your majesty According to my bond; nor more nor less.
Page 64 - Excitements of my reason and my blood, And let all sleep, while to my shame I see, The imminent death of twenty thousand men, That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, Go to their graves like beds...
Page 21 - Hear, Nature, hear ! dear goddess, hear ! Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend To make this creature fruitful ! Into her womb convey sterility ! Dry up in her the organs of increase, And from her derogate body never spring A babe to honour her...
Page 41 - ... twixt son and father. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there's son against father. The King falls from bias of nature; there's father against child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves.