The Making of the National Poet: Shakespeare, Adaptation and Authorship, 1660-1769 - Hardcover

Dobson, Michael

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0198112335 ISBN 13: 9780198112334

Publisher: Clarendon Press, 1992

Synopsis

The century between the Restoration and David Garrick's Stratford Jubilee saw William Shakespeare's promotion from the status of archaic, rustic playwright to that of England's timeless Bard, and with it the complete transformation of the ways in which his plays were staged, published, and read. But why Shakespeare, and what different interests did this process serve? "The Making of the National Poet" is the first full-length study since the 1920s of the Restoration and 18th century's revisions and revaluations of Shakespeare, and the first to consider the period's much-reviled stage adaptations in the context of the profound cultural changes in which they participate. Drawing on a wide range of evidence - including engravings, prompt-books, diaries, statuary, and previously unpublished poems (among them traces of the hitherto mysterious Shakespeare Ladies' Club), it examines how and why Shakespeare was retrospectively claimed as both a respectable Enlightenment author and a crucial and contested symbol of British national identity. It shows in particular how the deification of Shakespeare co-existed with and even demanded the drastic and sometimes bizarre rewriting of his plays for which the period is notorious. The book provides a thorough analysis of the definitive account of the theatre's role in establishing Shakespeare as Britain's National Poet. This book is aimed at scholars, graduates, advanced undergraduates studying Shakespeare, cultural historians studying 18th century, theatre historians, art historians.

About this title

Review

perceptive study ... this is an accessible, lucidly persuasive and enjoyable work ... It makes an important contribution to the study of the Shakespeare phenomenon, but has no sense of bitterness or parti pris, and it offers a fresh and necessary realignment of thinking about the stage adaptations of the plays between the 1660s and the 1760s. (Theatre Research International)

rich in insight ... clever, lucid and scrupulously researched (London Review of Books)

Dobson ... is one of the band of recent critics who have viewed the history of Shakespeare's reputation as a political matter. He proves himself to be certainly the wittiest and possibly the most learned and judicious of these critics. He has a marvellous way of unearthing some forgotten adaptation . . . he has a strong grasp of the intricacies of eighteenth-century politics. (Times Literary Supplement)

Edition details

• Publisher: Clarendon Press
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0198112335
• ISBN 13: 9780198112334
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 276