30 great myths about Shakespeare / Laurie Maguire, Emma Smith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Maguire, Laurie E.

Contributor:

Smith, Emma (Emma Josephine)

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616--Criticism and interpretation.

Shakespeare, William.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (vi, 216 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Chichester, U.K. ; Hoboken : Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.

Summary:

Think you know Shakespeare? Think again... Was a real skull used in the first performance of Hamlet? Were Shakespeare's plays Elizabethan blockbusters? How much do we really know about the playwright's life? And what of his notorious relationship with his wife? Exploring and exploding 30 popular myths about the great playwright, this illuminating new book evaluates all the evidence to show how historical material-or its absence-can be interpreted and misinterpreted, and what this reveals about our own personal investment in the stories we tell.

Contents:

Myth 1 Shakespeare was the most popular writer of his time

Myth 2 Shakespeare was not well educated

Myth 3 Shakespeare's plays should be performed in Elizabethan dress

Myth 4 Shakespeare was not interested in having his plays printed

Myth 5 Shakespeare never traveled

Myth 6 Shakespeare's plays are politically incorrect

Myth 7 Shakespeare was a Catholic

Myth 8 Shakespeare's plays had no scenery

Myth 9 Shakespeare's tragedies are more serious than his comedies

Myth 10 Shakespeare hated his wife

Myth 11 Shakespeare wrote in the rhythms of everyday speech

Myth 12 Hamlet was named after Shakespeare's son

Myth 13 The coarse bits of Shakespeare are for the groundlings, the philosophy is for the upper classes

Myth 14 Shakespeare was a Stratford playwright

Myth 15 Shakespeare was a plagiarist

Myth 16 We don't know much about Shakespeare's life

Myth 17 Shakespeare wrote alone

Myth 18 Shakespeare's sonnets are autobiographical

Myth 19 If Shakespeare were writing now, he'd be writing for Hollywood

Myth 20 The Tempest was Shakespeare's farewell to the stage

Myth 21 Shakespeare had a huge vocabulary

Myth 22 Shakespeare's plays are timeless

Myth 23 Macbeth is jinxed in the theater

Myth 24 Shakespeare did not revise his plays

Myth 25 Boy actors played women's roles

Myth 26 Shakespeare's plays don't work as movies

Myth 27 Yorick's skull was real

Myth 28 Queen Elizabeth loved Shakespeare's plays

Myth 29 Shakespeare's characters are like real people

Myth 30 Shakespeare didn't write Shakespeare.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781299157897

1299157890

9781118324868

1118324862

9781118324875

1118324870

OCLC:

827207612