Synopses & Reviews
Shakespeares plays abound with kings and leaders who crave a public stage and seize every opportunity to make their lives a performance: Antony, Cleopatra, Richard III, Othello, and many others. Such self-dramatizing characters appear in the work of other playwrights of the era as well, Marlowes Edward II and Tamburlaine among them. But Elizabethan playwrights were not alone in realizing that a sense of theater was essential to the exercise of power. Real rulers knew it, too, and none better than Queen Elizabeth. In this fascinating study of political stagecraft in the Elizabethan era, Garry Wills explores a period of vast cultural and political change during which the power of make-believe to make power real was not just a theory but an essential truth.
Wills examines English culture as Catholic Christianitys rituals were being overturned and a Protestant queen took the throne. New iconographies of power were necessary for the new Renaissance liturgy to displace the medieval church-state. The author illuminates the extensive imaginative constructions that went into Elizabeths reign and the explosion of great Tudor and Stuart drama that provided the imaginative power to support her long and successful rule.
Review
"As entertainingly readable as it is broadly informative.”—John Simon, New York Times Book Review on Rome and Rhetoric
Review
“This tour de force . . . shows why our view of ancient Rome is very much Shakespeares.”—Publishers Weekly
Review
“Informed by Romes great rhetoricians, Wills scrutinizes the kinds of rhetoric employed by Caesar, Brutus, Antony, and Cassius in turn, showing how these disclose their characters. . . . [A] penetrating, provocative analysis.”—Booklist
Review
"Rome and Rhetoric is a fascinating look at the way Shakespeare has shaped our view of ancient Rome through the characters of his Julius Caesar."—Philip Freeman, Author of Julius Caesar
Review
"[Wills] takes a creative approach to helping both novice and fluent readers of Shakespeare's plays understand particular cultural contexts and social mores of the Elizabethan period. . . . This book will be of particular value to those interested in immersing themselves in the traditions and values depicted in Julius Caesar."—T.J. Haskell, Choice
Synopsis
A penetrating study of the images, symbols, pageants, and creative performances ambitious Elizabethans used to secure political power
Shakespeare's plays abound with kings and leaders who crave a public stage and seize every opportunity to make their lives a performance: Antony, Cleopatra, Richard III, Othello, and many others. Such self-dramatizing characters appear in the work of other playwrights of the era as well, Marlowe's Edward II and Tamburlaine among them. But Elizabethan playwrights were not alone in realizing that a sense of theater was essential to the exercise of power. Real rulers knew it, too, and none better than Queen Elizabeth. In this fascinating study of political stagecraft in the Elizabethan era, Garry Wills explores a period of vast cultural and political change during which the power of make-believe to make power real was not just a theory but an essential truth.
Wills examines English culture as Catholic Christianity's rituals were being overturned and a Protestant queen took the throne. New iconographies of power were necessary for the new Renaissance liturgy to displace the medieval church-state. The author illuminates the extensive imaginative constructions that went into Elizabeth's reign and the explosion of great Tudor and Stuart drama that provided the imaginative power to support her long and successful rule.
Synopsis
A many-faceted examination of how Shakespeare brought Rome alive for his readers through a masterful manipulation of ancient rhetoric
Synopsis
Renaissance plays and poetry in England were saturated with the formal rhetorical twists that Latin education made familiar to audiences and readers. Yet a formally educated man like Ben Jonson was unable to make these ornaments come to life in his two classical Roman plays. Garry Wills, focusing his attention on
Julius Caesar, here demonstrates how Shakespeare so wonderfully made these ancient devices vivid, giving his characters their own personal styles of Roman speech.
In four chapters, devoted to four of the plays main characters, Wills shows how Caesar, Brutus, Antony, and Cassius each has his own take on the rhetorical ornaments that Elizabethans learned in school. Shakespeare also makes Rome present and animate by casting his troupe of experienced players to make their strengths shine through the historical facts that Plutarch supplied him with. The result is that the Rome English-speaking people carry about in their minds is the Rome that Shakespeare created for them. And that is even true, Wills affirms, for todays classical scholars with access to the original Roman sources.
About the Author
Garry Wills is Emeritus Professor of History at Northwestern University. Among his nearly forty books are
Rome and Rhetoric; Verdi’s Shakespeare; the Pulitzer Prize–winning
Lincoln at Gettysburg; and
Inventing America, a National Book Critics Circle Award winner. He lives in Chicago, IL.