Shakespeare Newsletter articles from December 2003

Shakespeare Newsletter archives from December 2003

The quality of mould in Henry V.
December 22, 2003... In a recent article in these columns--with the arresting title of "The Quality of Mercy in Henry V"--Mr. Ron Rosenbaum has commented very shrewdly on a line in this play, Pistol's bombastic pleas before the walls of Harfleur (3.2.19 [Pelican...

Kline Fine Falstaff; O'Brien's design falls short.(Kevin Kline in Jack O'Brien's Henry IV)(Theater reveiw)(Henry IV, Part I and Part II)(Theater Review)
December 22, 2003... Kevin Kline (b. 1947) is some fifty, or, by Our Lady, inclining to three score. Still, it seemed a little surprising for him to undertake the role of Falstaff at Lincoln Center in Jack O'Brien's Henry IV--an adaptation by Dakin Matthews of...

Lukas Erne's Shakespeare as Literary Dramatist.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... This is the latest among the many original books on Shakespeare published by Cambridge University Press (2003). Before discussing Erne's many new and heterodox ideas about Shakespeare as a "literary" (rather than purely theatrical) dramatist,...

Minutes of the Columbia Shakespeare Seminar: November 2003.
December 22, 2003... Tom Pendleton introduced the respondent and speaker. Respondent: Naomi Liebler teaches at Montclair State University where she is Professor of English and University Distinguished Scholar. In addition, she is a Trustee of the Shakespeare...

Celestial/Terrestrial Duet: the National Players in A Midsummer Night's Dream.(Theater Review)
December 22, 2003... A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that is just about as hard to ruin as it is to perform quite as well as it ought to be, so one rarely expects it to get its just desserts. On November 13th, the night of the greatest sustained winds in...

Jonathan Gil Harris and Natasha Korda, Eds. Staged Properties in Early Modern English Drama.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Jonathan Gil Harris and Natasha Korda, Eds. Staged Properties in Early Modern English Drama This interesting and timely volume edited by Jonathan Gil Harris and Natasha Korda (Cambridge University Press, 2002) brings together a dozen...

King Lear at Lincoln Center.(Theater review)(Theater Review)
December 22, 2003... The Stratford Festival of Canada has again given New York audiences one of its major productions. The repertory company demonstrates its depth and expertise, and Christopher Plummer offers one of the best performances of his life. Lear is a...

Talking books with: Jonathan Bate.
December 22, 2003... In a political climate where the writers of the past are often condemned for their limitations, where former "geniuses" are reduced to apologists for their contemporary power structure, it was admirably audacious of Jonathan Bate to title one...

Correction.(Correction Notice)
December 22, 2003... An editing error dropped a crucial sentence from Michael Jensen's "Talking Books" column in the Fall issue. On page 77, George T. Wright concludes his answer to Jensen's first question and Jensen responds as follows (the sentence in brackets...

Ioppolo, Grace, ed. A Routledge Literary Sourcebook on Shakespeare's "King Lear.".(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Ioppolo, Grace, ed. A Routledge Literary Sourcebook on Shakespeare's "King Lear." London: Routledge, 2003. CONTENTS: List of Illustrations, Series Editor's Preface, Acknowledgements. Introduction. I: Contexts. Contextual Overview,...

Smith, Barbara and Ursula Appelt, eds. Write or Be Written: Early Modern Women Poets and Cultural Constraints. Women and Gender in Early Modern England, 1500-1750.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Smith, Barbara and Ursula Appelt, eds. Write or Be Written: Early Modern Women Poets and Cultural Constraints. Women and Gender in Early Modern England, 1500-1750. Aldershot, Burlington USA, Singapore, Sydney: Ashgate, 2001. CONTENTS:...

Spolsky, Ellen. Satisfying Skepticism: Embodied Knowledge in the Early Modern World.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Spolsky, Ellen. Satisfying Skepticism: Embodied Knowledge in the Early Modern World. Aldershot, Burlington USA, Singapore, Sydney: Ashgate, 2001. CONTENTS: List of Illustrations. Acknowledgements. Introduction. 1 Skepticism and...

Erikson, Roy. The BUILDING in the text: Alberti to Shakespeare and Milton.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Erikson, Roy. The BUILDING in the text: Alberti to Shakespeare and Milton. University Park: The Pennsylvania State UP, 2001. CONTENTS: List of Illustrations. Acknowledgments. Introduction. (1) Architecture and the Art of Plotting. (2)...

Philip Stubbes, The Anatomie of Abuses.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Philip Stubbes, The Anatomie of Abuses, Edited by Margaret Jane Kidnie New editions of once influential writers always invite us to look at the authors anew and attempt to form fresh understandings of their styles, intellectual scope,...

Books for review.
December 22, 2003... Aebischer, Pascale, Edward J. Esche and Nigel Wheale, eds. Remaking Shakespeare: Performance Across Media, Genres and Cultures. Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. Cohen, Derek. Searching Shakespeare: Studies in Culture and Authority. University...

Wes Folkerth's The Sound of Shakespeare.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Wes Folkerth's The Sound of Shakespeare In The Sound of Shakespeare Wes Folkerth explores the "intuition that Shakespeare and his contemporaries had at base... a relationship to sound radically different from our own" (44). He charts...

The Sonnets on CD ROM.(Electronic Shakespeare)
December 22, 2003... Coordinating Editor, Internet Shakespeare Editions As floppy disks are moving towards the status of a curiosity, it is reasonable to wonder whether CD ROMs have any use beyond providing access to today's monstrously bloated programs from...

Shakespeare society medal to Peter Hall.(Shakespeare Society of New York )(Sir Peter Hall recognized for lifetime contribution to theater )
December 22, 2003... During a celebratory evening in the Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College in Manhattan, on 15 December 2003, the Shakespeare Society of New York awarded its medal to Sir Peter Hall in recognition of a lifetime's contributions to the theatre,...

The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Stage.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... If it seems odd to recommend this sometimes unexciting book, that is down to the nature of introductory texts. Most of the material in the early chapters is well known, and its presentation too familiar. The title is also a bit of a misnomer....

Psycho Sycorax.(Review of Periodicals)
December 22, 2003... Psycho Sycorax Performance artist Chin Woon Ping writes of her intentions in staging her play Psycho Wracks, a Tempest-inspired work featuring Caliban's mother Sycorax as sole character, and goes on to describe the play itself, performed...

Peter Drucker, Puttenham, and 1 Henry VI.(Review of Periodicals)
December 22, 2003... In an age when one can find books on Shakespeare and management in the business section of Barnes & Noble, it seems fair that Shakespeare scholars should reverse the formula and use Peter Drucker's work as a handbook to illuminate Joan of...

All Is Well That Ends Well.(Review of Periodicals)
December 22, 2003... Speaking of All's Well, Jane Freeman has departed from the currently popular skepticism regarding that play's action and title in an article that says the play's end may be more hopeful than we think. She summarizes the views of recent...

Characterization through music in Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet.(Review of Periodicals)
December 22, 2003... Karen Bennett, who clearly knows her musical stuff, makes specialized musical analysis comprehensible to lay readers in her careful discussion of how the Russian composer Prokofiev adapted melodic themes to characters in his ballet version of...

Conference announcement.
December 22, 2003... In conjunction with the theme of the 2006 issue of the Shakespeare Yearbook, "Shakespeare in China" (co-edited with Lingui Yang), the journal will sponsor a special session at the Annual Meeting of the MLA (Philadelphia, December 27-30,...

A take on "Abraham Cupid" in Romeo and Juliet 2.1.(Critical Essay)
December 22, 2003... When, after leaving the Capulet feast, Romeo's friends try to find him in the streets of Verona, Mercutio begs him to respond to his calls: Cry but 'Ay me!' Pronounce but 'love' and 'dove', Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,...

Dennis Kennedy's Looking at Shakespeare.(Book Review)
December 22, 2003... Kennedy's Looking at Shakespeare (2002) is a treasure trove for lovers of Shakespeare on the stage. Using vivid, fluent description and accompanying pictures, Kennedy creates fascinating glimpses of varied productions of Shakespeare. ...

King Lear: Rational Madness.(Theater review)(Theater Review)
December 22, 2003... Every director must shudder at first sight of that big stage at the Vivian Beaumont Theater. How much more so if the play is King Lear, when, during most of Act One, only two people are interacting on stage. Director Jonathan Miller turned...

Actors (a Shakespeare cento).(Poet's Corner)(Brief Article)(Poem)
December 22, 2003... Actors (A Shakespeare Cento) Our revels now are ended. These our actors, unstaid and skittish in all motions else, nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on; and all the rest forgot for which he toiled. They...