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Shakespeare and the Idea of Apocrypha

Negotiating the Boundaries of the Dramatic Canon

Peter Kirwan author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Cambridge University Press

Published:13th Jun '19

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Shakespeare and the Idea of Apocrypha cover

This book explores the methodologies and assumptions governing answers to the question 'what did Shakespeare actually write?'

This book explores how, and on what grounds, plays have been excluded from the Shakespeare canon over the past four centuries. Combining approaches from varying fields of interest, it will appeal to researchers and graduate students in Shakespeare studies, early modern drama, theatre history, book history and attribution studies.In addition to the thirty-six plays of the First Folio, some eighty plays have been attributed in whole or part to William Shakespeare, yet most are rarely read, performed or discussed. This book, the first to confront the implications of the 'Shakespeare Apocrypha', asks how and why these plays have historically been excluded from the canon. Innovatively combining approaches from book history, theatre history, attribution studies and canon theory, Peter Kirwan unveils the historical assumptions and principles that shaped the construction of the Shakespeare canon. Case studies treat plays such as Sir Thomas More, Edward III, Arden of Faversham, Mucedorus, Double Falsehood and A Yorkshire Tragedy, showing how the plays' contested 'Shakespearean' status has shaped their fortunes. Kirwan's book rethinks the impact of authorial canons on the treatment of anonymous and disputed plays.

'In this smart and timely book, Kirwan returns Shakespeare's apocryphal plays to their original habitat, namely, the repertory of a commercial playing company; thus relocated, the plays may be appraised as they were in their own time: on market value, not authorship.' Roslyn L. Knutson, University of Arkansas

ISBN: 9781107479982

Dimensions: 230mm x 152mm x 15mm

Weight: 400g

270 pages