Shakespeare on the University Stage

Q2 Arts and Humanities Shakespeare Studies Pub Date : 2016-01-01 DOI:10.5860/choice.190462
J. Loehlin
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引用次数: 2

Abstract

Shakespeare on the University Stage. Edited by Andrew James Hartley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015 Andrew James Hartley's collection Shakespeare on the University Stage brings together sixteen essays that examine the phenomenon of campus Shakespeare from a range of historical, cultural, aesthetic and theoretical perspectives. As Hartley points out in his introduction, such performances provide the primary experience of live Shakespeare for many people around the world (and especially in the United States), yet they are remarkably evanescent and understudied. This impressive book helps to fill what Hartley has elsewhere called "one of Shakespeare criticism's singular blind spots" (Shakespeare Survey 65 [2012], 194). Shakespeare on the University Stage asks a range of searching questions in an attempt to understand the complex variety of university Shakespeare: "How does it uniquely manifest larger cultural concerns, assumptions, and prejudices, and how is it shaped by the pedagogical dimension of its academic context? How do such productions subvert or confirm ideas about theatre in general and Shakespeare in particular that are disseminated through the larger culture in complex and unexamined ways, and what is the relationship of those ideas to their equivalents on the professional stage?" (8-9). The diverse essays in Shakespeare on the University Stage provide an array of answers to these and other questions, and they certainly encourage sustained future scholarship on this neglected topic. The book begins and ends with two leaders in the Shakespeare performance field, Peter Holland and W. B. Worthen, who provide, respectively, a historical context for campus Shakespeare and a theoretical interrogation of it. In between, essays explore the development of Shakespeare performance in a range of international educational traditions. Many consider the cultural status of Shakespeare and the politics implicit in his role in education; several note how campus Shakespeare performances provide a laboratory for current concerns about ideology and identity (especially gender identity). Hartley's concern is not with how performance is used in classroom teaching, a topic much discussed elsewhere, but with actual productions: both those formally mounted by university departments as part of their teaching mission and cultural calendar, and those put on by ad hoc student groups for creative expression, intellectual enrichment, or simply fun. The essays in Shakespeare on the University Stage are not subdivided into labeled sections, but there is a meaningful arc to their organization. The book begins with the history of university Shakespeare in the Anglo-American world, then branches out into a consideration of different global traditions, and ends with a consideration of some of the challenges, and new potentialities, for educational Shakespeare performance today. Holland begins the historical section with a series of snapshots of early campus Shakespeare: from Polonius' memories of having "played once i' th' university," to the 1610 Oxford performance at which Desdemona moved the spectators to pity, to the jesting about Shakespeare, Burbage and Kemp in the Cambridge Parnassus plays. Surprisingly, there seems to have been no regular performance of Shakespeare at the English universities until well into the nineteenth century. When it came, it was amateur and unofficial, performed by student dramatic societies, and neither connected to the university curriculum nor to the professional theater. Eventually, it became associated with both (at least in the United States), as English and then Drama/Theatre emerged as academic disciplines, each with its own investment in Shakespeare. This brief but complicated history has made campus Shakespeare "a paradoxical cultural and pedagogical event," according to Holland: "It works in the complex interstices of competing and irreconcilable demands between college and community, between pedagogy and pleasure" (26). …
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大学舞台上的莎士比亚
大学舞台上的莎士比亚。安德鲁·詹姆斯·哈特利编辑。剑桥:剑桥大学出版社,2015年安德鲁·詹姆斯·哈特利的《大学舞台上的莎士比亚》汇集了16篇文章,从历史、文化、美学和理论的角度研究了校园莎士比亚现象。正如哈特利在前言中指出的那样,这样的表演为世界各地的许多人(尤其是美国人)提供了第一手的现场莎士比亚体验,但它们却非常短暂,而且没有得到充分的研究。这本令人印象深刻的书有助于填补哈特利在其他地方所说的“莎士比亚评论的单一盲点之一”(莎士比亚调查65[2012],194)。《大学舞台上的莎士比亚》提出了一系列探索性的问题,试图理解大学莎士比亚的复杂多样性:“它是如何独特地体现更大的文化关注、假设和偏见的?它是如何被学术背景的教学维度塑造的?”这些作品是如何颠覆或确认关于戏剧,特别是莎士比亚的观念的,这些观念是如何以复杂和未经检验的方式通过更大的文化传播的,这些观念与专业舞台上的对等物之间的关系是什么?”(8 - 9)。《大学舞台上的莎士比亚》中各种各样的文章为这些问题和其他问题提供了一系列的答案,它们肯定会鼓励未来在这个被忽视的话题上持续的学术研究。这本书的开头和结尾都是莎士比亚表演领域的两位领军人物,彼得·霍兰德(Peter Holland)和w·b·沃森(W. B. Worthen),他们分别为校园莎士比亚提供了历史背景,并对其进行了理论追问。在此期间,论文探讨了莎士比亚表演在一系列国际教育传统中的发展。许多人认为莎士比亚的文化地位和政治隐含在他的教育角色中;一些人注意到校园莎士比亚表演如何为当前对意识形态和身份(尤其是性别身份)的关注提供了一个实验室。哈特利关注的不是如何在课堂教学中使用表演,这是一个在其他地方被广泛讨论的话题,而是实际的作品:既有大学院系作为教学任务和文化日历的一部分正式安装的,也有学生团体为了创造性表达、智力丰富或仅仅是娱乐而制作的。《大学舞台上的莎士比亚》中的文章并没有被细分成有标签的部分,但它们的组织有一个有意义的弧线。这本书从英美世界大学莎士比亚的历史开始,然后延伸到对不同全球传统的考虑,最后考虑了今天教育莎士比亚表演的一些挑战和新的潜力。霍兰德以一系列早期校园莎士比亚的快照作为历史部分的开始:从波洛尼尔斯对“在大学里演出一次”的回忆,到1610年牛津大学的演出,苔丝狄蒙娜打动了观众的同情,再到剑桥帕纳萨斯戏剧中对莎士比亚、白贝芝和坎普的嘲笑。令人惊讶的是,直到19世纪,英国的大学里似乎都没有定期上演莎士比亚的作品。当它出现时,它是业余和非官方的,由学生戏剧社团表演,与大学课程和专业戏剧都没有联系。最终,随着英语和戏剧/戏剧成为学术学科,它与两者都联系在一起(至少在美国),每个学科都有自己对莎士比亚的投资。这段短暂而复杂的历史使校园莎士比亚成为“一个矛盾的文化和教育事件”,据霍兰德说:“它在大学和社区之间、教育和娱乐之间相互竞争和不可调和的需求的复杂间隙中发挥作用”(26)。…
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Shakespeare Studies
Shakespeare Studies Arts and Humanities-Literature and Literary Theory
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期刊介绍: Shakespeare Studies is an international volume published every year in hard cover, containing essays and studies by critics and cultural historians from both hemispheres. It includes substantial reviews of significant books and essays dealing with the cultural history of early modern England, as well as the place of Shakespeare"s productions—and those of his contemporaries—within it. Volume XXXII continues the second in a series of essays on "Early Modern Drama around the World" in which specialists in theatrical traditions from around the globe during the time of Shakespeare discuss the state of scholarly study in their respective areas.
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"Try what repentance can": Hamlet, Confession, and the Extraction of Interiority Shakespeare's Demonology: A Dictionary Shakespeare on the University Stage Barbarous Antiquity: Reorienting the Past in the Poetry of Early Modern England The Poetics of Piracy: Emulating Spain in English Literature
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