Synopses & Reviews
Highly readable
A marvelous trip through four centuries of English literary and theatrical history.”Dallas Morning News A unique addition to the Shakespeare canon, this book begins where most Shakespeare stories end, with his death in 1616. Jack Lynch has written the definitive biography of William Shakespeares afterlifetwo hundred years during which he grew from a modestly successful provincial playwright to the lofty status of transcendent genius at the heart of English culture. Jack Lynch, a professor of English at Rutgers University, has been studying the curious afterlife of William Shakespeare for more than fifteen years. He is the editor of Samuel Johnsons Dictionary and Samuel Johnsons Insults. He lives in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. Becoming Shakespeare begins where most Shakespeare stories endwith his death in 1616and relates the fascinating story of his unlikely transformation from provincial playwright to universal Bard. Unlike later literary giants, Shakespeare created no stir when he died. Though hed once had a string of hit plays, he had been retired in the country for six years, and only his family, friends, and business partners seemed to care that he was gone. Within a few years he was nearly forgotten. And when Londons theaters were shut down in 1642, he seemed destined for oblivion.
With the Restoration in 1660, though, the theaters were open once again, and Shakespeare began his long ascent: No longer merely one playwright among many, he became the transcendent genius at the heart of English culture. Fifty years later, scholars began taking him seriously. Fifty years after that, he was considered Englands greatest genius. And by 1800 he was practically divine.
Jack Lynch vividly chronicles Shakespeares afterlifefrom the revival of his plays to the decades when his work was co-opted and improved” by politicians and other playwrights, and culminating with the Bardolatry” of the Stratford celebration of Shakespeares three-hundredth birthday in 1864. Becoming Shakespeare is not only essential reading for anyone intrigued by Shakespeare, but it also offers a consideration of the vagaries of fame.
An accessible chronicle of Shakespeare's rise to his present glory. Samuel Johnson scholar Lynch (English/Rutgers) quickly makes clear what this study involves: the long process that turned a very competent playwright into a demigod. Picking up where many a Shakespearean leaves off, he dismisses the authorship question entirely. Fantasies about faked deaths and undercover noblemen certainly make for an exciting story, he writes, but there's nothing to them. Lynch focuses instead on charting Shakespeare's transformation from a popular playwright in his day to a writer many now consider the keystone of the Western literary canon. This metamorphosis, he contends, has taken hundreds of years and the collected efforts of numerous individuals from a variety of arenas, some more predictable than others. It was only after the Restoration in 1660, for instance, that Shakespeare's work gained onstage life it hadn't known since the Puritans closed the public theatres in 1642. Charles II sanctioned two new theatres, which brought drama back to the fore of London life and enabled late-17th- to early-18th-century actors such as Thomas Betterton, James Quin, David Garrick and Sarah Siddons to gain great fame by playing Shakespeare's leading roles. Lynch provocatively argues that the great rise in literacy occurring around the time of the Restoration also contributed to the birth of critical interest in the plays as texts; fierce disputes arose over their interpretation, the manna of Shakespeare criticism to this day. He engagingly details the strengths, shortcomings and literary relevance of major editions alongside those now merely of historical interest because they attempted to sanitize thebawdy bard to reflect the more decorous tastes of late-18th-century or Victorian sensibilities. Pitched just right for students of literature, Shakespeareans and those interested in the history of drama: a witty and appealing story of how a superstar was born.”Kirkus Reviews
Not long after Shakespeare's death, in 1616, the puritans closed England's theaters, and when Charles II reopened them in 1660, Shakespeare's plays were understandably forgotten. It took a long process of revival, performance, study, improvement (adulteration, to modern eyes), co-optation, domestication, forgery, and, finally, what amounted to worship to establish Shakespeare as the transcendent genius of the English language. Lynch devotes a lively, well-informed chapter to each aspect of that process as he argues that Shakespeare was transformed into a secular saint by successive waves of actors, scholars, adapters, propagandists, expurgators, self-aggrandizers, and cultural entrepreneurs. The apotheosis took some 250 years and involved great names in English cultural history (most notably, the actor David Garrick) and quite a few astonishing miscreants, such as the forger William Henry Ireland, who only wanted his father's respect, it seems. Lynch makes virtually every one of these figures fascinating, amusingly revealing their idiosyncrasies without letting any of them obscure the ongoing movement he traces. A book for Shakespeareans of all stripes to relish with gusto.”Booklist
"It's easy to assume that William Shakespeare has always held his position at the top of the literary canon. But the truth is not that simple, as Lynch, a professor of English at Rutgers and longtime student of literary history, demonstrates. He ably chronicles how 'in three hundred years, William Shakespeare the talented playwright and theatre shareholder had become Shakespeare the transcendent demigod,' against whom no slight of literary criticism was too small not to be deemed heresy. Along the way, Shakespeare was all but forgotten; criticized for his sloppy, profane dramaturgy; rewritten, forged and bowdlerized (literally, by the eponymous Bowdler); hijacked as a spokesperson for political causes of all stripes; revered and, finally, unquestioningly glorified. Lynch tells the story of the personalities and politics that shaped both the reception of the Bard's works and the development of the theater in England between 1616, the year of Shakespeare's death, and 1864, his 300th birthday. Lynch writes fluidly about the Puritan aspirations that shut the English theaters after Queen Elizabeth's death, the Restoration and consequent revitalization of London's theatrical culture, the rise of celebrity culture and the spread of literacy that took Shakespeare off the stage and into the parlor and classroom."Publishers Weekly
Synopsis
“Highly readable…A marvelous trip through four centuries of English literary and theatrical history.”—Dallas Morning News A unique addition to the Shakespeare canon, this book begins where most Shakespeare stories end, with his death in 1616. Jack Lynch has written the definitive biography of William Shakespeares afterlife—two hundred years during which he grew from a modestly successful provincial playwright to the lofty status of transcendent genius at the heart of English culture.
Synopsis
"Becoming Shakespeare" begins where most Shakespeare stories end-with his death in 1616-and relates the fascinating story of his unlikely transformation from provincial playwright to universal Bard. Unlike later literary giants, Shakespeare created no stir when he died. Though he'd once had a string of hit plays, he had been retired in the country for six years, and only his family, friends, and business partners seemed to care that he was gone. Within a few years he was nearly forgotten. And when London's theaters were shut down in 1642, he seemed destined for oblivion.
With the Restoration in 1660, though, the theaters were open once again, and Shakespeare began his long ascent: No longer merely one playwright among many, he became the transcendent genius at the heart of English culture. Fifty years after the Restoration scholars began taking him seriously. Fifty years after that he was considered England's greatest genius. And by 1800 he was practically divine.
Jack Lynch vividly chronicles Shakespeare's afterlife-from the revival of his plays to the decades when his work was co-opted and "improved" by politicians and other playwrights, and culminating with the "Bardolatry" of the Stratford celebration of Shakespeare's three-hundredth birthday in 1864. "Becoming Shakespeare" is not only essential reading for anyone intrigued by Shakespeare, but it also offers a consideration of the vagaries of fame.
About the Author
Jack Lynch is a professor of English at Rutgers U niversity. He is the author of The Age of Elizabeth in the Age of Johnson and the editor of Samuel Johnsons Dictionary and Samuel Johnsons Insults.