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Shakespeare Day

Widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the English language and the world’s greatest dramatist, William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright and actor. Shakespeare’s plays being translated in over 50 languages and performed across the globe for audiences of all ages. Shakespeare was also an actor and the creator of the Globe Theatre, a historical theatre, and company that is visited by hundreds of thousands of tourists every year.

In recognition of Shakespeare’s birth and death day,  we are delighted to showcase our growing book series, SHAKESPEARE &, exploring Shakespeare and his work outside the lens of traditional literary studies. By intersecting the worlds beyond fiction and poetry with those disciplines outside of literature and drama, this series offers nuanced approaches that reveal a more diverse and complex legacy left by Shakespeare.

Berghahn Journals is also offering FULL ACCESS to Critical Survey* until April 29, 2022! To access, use the code Shakespeare22. View redemption instructions.


Shakespeare &

Series Editor:
Graham Holderness, University of Hertfordshire

Interesting in submitting to the series? Formal submissions should be sent directly to Berghahn Books. For more information on Berghahn’s manuscript submission procedure, please look at the Info for Authors section on this web site. All submissions to this series, as well as any queries about the formal procedure, should be sent to editorialUS@berghahnbooks.com.

Volume 9 Forthcoming

SHAKESPEARE AND THE FIRST HAMLET
Edited by Terri Bourus
Afterword by Graham Holderness and Bryan Loughrey

The first edition of Hamlet – often called ‘Q1’, shorthand for ‘first quarto’ – was published in 1603, in what we might regard as the early modern equivalent of a cheap paperback. Yet this early version of Shakespeare’s classic tragedy is becoming increasingly canonical, not because there is universal agreement about what it is or what it means, but because more and more Shakespearians agree that it is worth arguing about. The essays in this collected volume explore the ways in which we might approach Q1’s Hamlet, from performance to book history, from Shakespeare’s relationships with his contemporaries to the shape of his whole career.

Volume 8

SHAKESPEARE AND BIOGRAPHY
Edited by Katherine Scheil and Graham Holderness

From Shakespeare’s religion to his wife to his competitors in the world of early modern theatre, biographers have approached the question of the Bard’s life from numerous angles. Shakespeare & Biography offers a fresh look at the biographical questions connected with the famous playwright’s life, through essays and reflections written by prominent international scholars and biographers.

Read Introduction

Volume 7

SHAKESPEARE AND MONEY
Edited by Graham Holderness

Though better known for his literary merits, Shakespeare made money, wrote about money and enabled money-making by countless others in his name. With chapters by leading scholars on the economic, financial and commercial ramifications of his work, this multifaceted volume connects the Bard to both early modern and contemporary economic conditions, revealing Shakespeare to have been a serious economist in his own right.

Read Introduction

Volume 6

SHAKESPEARE AND HIS BIOGRAPHICAL AFTERLIVES 
Edited by Paul Franssen and Paul Edmondson

New Shakespeare biographies are published every year, though very little new documentary evidence has come to light. Inevitably speculative, these biographies straddle the line between fact and fiction. Shakespeare and His Biographical Afterlives explores the relationship between fiction and non-fiction within Shakespeare’s biography, across a range of subjects including feminism, class politics, wartime propaganda, children’s fiction, and religion, expanding beyond the Anglophone world to include countries such as Germany and Spain, from the seventeenth century to present day.

Read Introduction

Volume 5

SHAKESPEARE AND THE ETHICS OF WAR
Edited by Patrick Gray

How does Shakespeare represent war? This volume reviews scholarship to date on the question and introduces new perspectives, looking at contemporary conflict through the lens of the past. Through his haunting depiction of historical bloodshed, including the Trojan War, the fall of the Roman Republic, and the Wars of the Roses, Shakespeare illuminates more recent political violence, ranging from the British occupation of Ireland to the Spanish Civil War, the Balkans War, and the past several decades of U. S. military engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan. Can a war be just? What is the relation between the ruler and the ruled? What motivates ethnic violence? Shakespeare’s plays serve as the frame for careful explorations of perennial problems of human co-existence: the politics of honor, the ethics of diplomacy, the responsibility of non-combatants, and the tension between idealism and Realpolitik.

Read Chapter 1. Shakespeare and War: Honour at the Stake

Volume 4

SHAKESPEARE AND CREATIVE CRITICISM
Edited by Rob Conkie and Scott Maisano

What kinds of critical insights are made possible only or especially via creative strategies? This volume examines how creative modes of writing might facilitate or inform new ways to critically engage with Shakespeare. Creative writing, demonstrated in a series of essays, reflections, stories and scenes, operates as a vehicle for exploring and articulating critical and theoretical ideas. In doing so, Shakespeare’s enduring creative and critical appeal is newly understood and critiqued.

Read Introduction

Volume 3

SHAKESPEARE AND THE ARAB WORLD
Edited by Katherine Hennessey and Margaret Litvin

Offering a variety of perspectives on the history and role of Arab Shakespeare translation, production, adaptation and criticism, this volume explores both international and locally focused Arab/ic appropriations of Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets. In addition to Egyptian and Palestinian theatre, the contributors to this collection examine everything from an Omani performance in Qatar and an Upper Egyptian television series to the origin of the sonnets to an English-language novel about the Lebanese civil war. Addressing materials produced in several languages from literary Arabic (fuṣḥā) and Egyptian colloquial Arabic (‘ammiyya) to Swedish and French, these scholars and translators vary in discipline and origin, and together exhibit the diversity and vibrancy of this field.

Read Introduction

Volume 2

SHAKESPEARE AND COMMEMORATION
Edited by Clara Calvo and Ton Hoenselaars

Memory and commemoration play a vital role not only in the work of Shakespeare, but also in the process that has made him a world author. As the contributors of this collection demonstrate, the phenomenon of commemoration has no single approach, as it occurs on many levels, has a long history, and is highly unpredictable in its manifestations. With an international focus and a comparative scope that explores the afterlives also of other artists, this volume shows the diverse modes of commemorative practices involving Shakespeare. Delving into these “cultures of commemoration,” it presents keen insights into the dynamics of authorship, literary fame, and afterlives in its broader socio-historical contexts.

Read Introduction

Volume 1

SHAKESPEARE AND STRATFORD
Edited by Katherine Scheil
Afterword by Nicola J. Watson

As the site of literary pilgrimage since the eighteenth century, the home of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the topic of hundreds of imaginary portrayals, Stratford is ripe for analysis, both in terms of its factual existence and its fictional afterlife. The essays in this volume consider the various manifestations of the physical and metaphorical town on the Avon, across time, genre and place, from America to New Zealand, from children’s literature to wartime commemorations. We meet many Stratfords in this collection, real and imaginary, and the interplay between the two generates new visions of the place.

Read Preface

For more information, please visit the series webpage.


Berghahn Journals

Celebrate Shakespeare Day with free access to Critical Survey until April 29! To access, use code Shakespeare22. View details here.