[PDF] Playing Bit Parts In Shakespeare eBook

Author : M.M. Mahood
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 497 pages
File Size : 27,93 MB
Release : 2002-09-11
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 1134673647

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Playing Bit Parts in Shakespeare is a unique survey of the small supporting roles - such as foils, feeds, attendants and messengers - that feature in Shakespeare's plays. Exploring such issues as how bit players should conduct themselves within a scene, and how blank verse or prose may be spoken to bring out the complexities of character-definition, Playing Bit Parts in Shakespeare brings a wealth of insights to the dynamic of scenic construction in Shakespeare's dramaturgy. M.M. Mahood explores the different functions of minimal characters, from clearing the stage to epitomizing the overall effect of the comedy or tragedy, and looks at how they can extend the audience's knowledge of the social world of the play. She goes on to describe the entire corpus of minimal roles in a selection of six plays: * Richard III * The Tempest * King Lear * Antony & Cleopatra * Measure for Measure * Julius Caesar This new edition comes enhanced with a new Appendix, 'Who Says What', especially designed to aid directors in making decisions about the speaking parts of the minimal characters. It also comes complete with an index of characters (including line references) as well as a detailed general index. An invaluable aid for directors and actors in the rehearsal room, this perceptive and informative volume is equally of interest to students studying and writing about Shakespeare's plays.

Author : John Barton
Publisher : Anchor
Page : 286 pages
File Size : 37,98 MB
Release : 2010-11-10
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 0307773914

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Playing Shakespeare is the premier guide to understanding and appreciating the mastery of the world’s greatest playwright. Together with Royal Shakespeare Company actors–among them Patrick Stewart, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Ben Kingsley, and David Suchet–John Barton demonstrates how to adapt Elizabethan theater for the modern stage. The director begins by explicating Shakespeare’s verse and prose, speeches and soliloquies, and naturalistic and heightened language to discover the essence of his characters. In the second section, Barton and the actors explore nuance in Shakespearean theater, from evoking irony and ambiguity and striking the delicate balance of passion and profound intellectual thought, to finding new approaches to playing Shakespeare’s most controversial creation, Shylock, from The Merchant of Venice. A practical and essential guide, Playing Shakespeare will stand for years as the authoritative favorite among actors, scholars, teachers, and students.

Author : Molly Maureen Mahood
Publisher :
Page : 252 pages
File Size : 50,98 MB
Release : 1992
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 9780521416122

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Molly Mahood's survey of the small supporting roles which abound in Shakespeare's plays addresses the interests of scholars, actors and directors.

Author : Lauren Gunderson
Publisher : Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
Page : 95 pages
File Size : 12,13 MB
Release : 2018-06-18
Category : Drama
ISBN : 0822237725

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Without William Shakespeare, we wouldn’t have literary masterpieces like Romeo and Juliet. But without Henry Condell and John Heminges, we would have lost half of Shakespeare’s plays forever! After the death of their friend and mentor, the two actors are determined to compile the First Folio and preserve the words that shaped their lives. They’ll just have to borrow, beg, and band together to get it done. Amidst the noise and color of Elizabethan London, THE BOOK OF WILL finds an unforgettable true story of love, loss, and laughter, and sheds new light on a man you may think you know.

Author : John Lennard
Publisher : Humanities-Ebooks
Page : 114 pages
File Size : 17,75 MB
Release : 2010-01-01
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 184760174X

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A theatre-based study guide to Shakespeare's greatest play, emphasising the conditions of Jacobethan production, textual variations, and aspects of modern performance, rather than the background of ideas or critical interpretations. This book aims to introduce students (including those with little or no prior experience of the field) to the worlds of Shakespeare and his theatre revealed in King Lear. It begins by 'Approaching Shakespeare' as utterly a man of the theatre, a professional actor before he was a playwright and a resident dramatist who knew intimately the actors for whom he wrote. It continues by discussing 'King Lear' in that light. The middle chapters look in detail at the 'Actors and Players' of the drama, and at Shakespeare's favourite 'Acts and Devices' as deployed within it. A final chapter considers the concept of 'comedic agony'. The annotated Bibliography includes the current major editions, major film-adaptations, and a selection of both the best criticism and the most useful websites.

Author : Kai Wiegandt
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 228 pages
File Size : 48,98 MB
Release : 2016-04-22
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 1317156889

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In this study, the author offers new interpretations of Shakespeare's works in the context of two major contemporary notions of collectivity: the crowd and rumour. The plays illustrate that rumour and crowd are mutually dependent; they also betray a fascination with the fact that crowd and rumour make individuality disappear. Shakespeare dramatizes these mechanisms, relating the crowd to class conflict, to rhetoric, to the theatre and to the organization of the state; and linking rumour to fear, to fame and to philosophical doubt. Paying attention to all levels of collectivity, Wiegandt emphasizes the close relationship between the crowd onstage and the Elizabethan audience. He argues that there was a significant - and sometimes precarious - metatheatrical blurring between the crowd on the stage and the crowd around the stage in performances of crowd scenes. The book's focus on crowd and rumour provides fresh insights on the central problems of some of Shakespeare's most contentiously debated plays, and offers an alternative to the dominant tradition of celebrating Shakespeare as the origin of modern individualism.

Author : William E. Engel
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 167 pages
File Size : 45,14 MB
Release : 2016-04-08
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 1317168046

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Paying special attention to Sidney's Arcadia, Spenser's Faerie Queene, and Shakespeare's romances, this study engages in sustained examination of chiasmus in early modern English literature. The author's approach leads to the recovery of hidden designs which are shown to animate important works of literature; along the way Engel offers fresh and more comprehensive interpretations of seemingly shopworn conventions such as memento mori conceits, echo poems, and the staging of deus ex machina. The study, grounded in the philosophy of symbolic forms (following Ernst Cassirer), will be a valuable resource for readers interested in intellectual history and symbol theory, classical mythology and Renaissance iconography. Chiastic Designs affords a glimpse into the transformative power of allegory during the English Renaissance by addressing patterns that were part and parcel of early modern "mnemonic culture."

Author : Ros King
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 216 pages
File Size : 16,83 MB
Release : 2011-03-01
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 1780740484

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Whether the fault of tedious teachers or hammy actors, Shakespeare is often seen as dry and impenetrable. In this fast-paced introduction, Ros King sets out to remind us of the sheer beauty and sophistication that can make Shakespeare's works a joy for any audience. Exploring his invention, wit, along with his uncanny characterisation, King argues archaic language should be no barrier to the modern reader. With summaries of The Bard's life and background, explanations of the plays' origins, and instructions on how to read his poetry, Shakespeare: A Beginner's Guide provides all the tools the general reader needs to embrace our greatest writer.

Author : Judith Weil
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 222 pages
File Size : 36,42 MB
Release : 2005-06-09
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 1139444573

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This is an unusual study of the nature of service and other types of dependency and patronage in Shakespeare's drama. By considering the close associations of service with childhood or youth, marriage and friendship, Judith Weil sheds light on social practice and dramatic action. Approached as dynamic explorations of a familiar custom, the plays are shown to demonstrate a surprising consciousness of obligations, and a fascination with how dependants actively change each other. They help us understand why early modern people may have found service both frightening and enabling. Attentive to a range of historical sources, and social and cultural issues, Weil also emphasises the linguistic ambiguities created by service relationships, and their rich potential for interpretation on the stage. The book includes close readings of dramatic sequences in twelve plays, including Hamlet, Macbeth, The Taming of the Shrew and King Lear.