Synopses & Reviews
A survey of the formal conventions of the drama of Shakespeare and his contemporaries.
Review
"Lopez gives us illuminating new readings of a number of Shakespearian and other plays. Highly recommended." bibliotheque d'humanisme et Renaissance
Review
"...an energetic discussion...provides an always interesting argument about what Elizabethan and Jacobean drama "assumes of its audience and how its audience experiences it and responds to it"." Susan Bennett, University of Calgary, Theatre Journal"Lopez gives us illuminating new readings of a number of Shakespearian and other plays. Highly recommended." Bibliotheque d'humanisme et Renaissance"Fascinating." Studies in English Literature
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references (p. 229-233) and index.
Synopsis
This book provides a detailed and comprehensive survey of the diverse, theatrically vital formal conventions of the drama of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Focusing on the relationship between the repertory system and the conventions and content of the plays, Lopez proposes that understanding the potential for theatrical failure - the way playwrights anticipated it and audiences responded to it - is crucial for understanding the way in which the drama succeeded on the stage.
About the Author
Jeremy Lopez is Assistant Professor of English Literature at the College of William and Mary.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments; Introduction; Part I: 1. âAs it was acted to great applauseâ: Elizabethan and Jacobean audiences and the physicality of response; 2. Meat, magic and metamorphosis: on puns and wordplay; 3. Managing the aside; 4. Exposition, redundancy, action; 5. Disorder and convention; Part II: Introduction to part II; 6. Drama of disappointment: character and narrative in Elizabethan and Jacobean tragedy; 7. Laughter and narrative in Elizabethan and Jacobean comedy; 8. Epilogue: Jonson and Shakespeare; Plays and editions cited; Works cited; Index.