Farah Karim-Cooper – författare

Eight exciting Shakespeare retellings for kids, alongside the story of his life and the history of Tudor London, all beautifully illustrated.Introduce your child to the work of William Shakespeare in this gorgeous treasury for all the family to enjoy. By expertly reimagining eight of the Bard’s most famous plays, Dr Farah Karim-Cooper breathes new life into these well-loved works, making them highly engaging for a new generation of fans.Including child-friendly summaries of eight renowned Shakespeare plays:Romeo and JulietMacbethThe Tragedy of Hamlet, the Prince of DenmarkA Midsummer Night’s DreamAs You Like ItThe Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of VeniceThe TempestThe Merchant of VeniceAdditional features:Fun facts about the life and times of Shakespeare, plus interesting information on how they created the sounds and smells in The Tempest, and the magic and fairies in A Midsummer Night’s DreamBeautifully illustrated throughout, with charming representations of popular characters and scenes from each playA fantastic educational gift for children aged 7-11 or a brilliant classroom resource, created to instil artistic passion in a new generation of theatre enthusiastsWith insightful and engaging storytelling combined with historical context and key themes for each play, readers will discover how Shakespeare gives us tools to think about the world today – and realise that Shakespeare really is for everyone, across every age group and time period!

Eight exciting Shakespeare retellings for kids, alongside the story of his life and the history of Tudor London, all beautifully illustrated.Introduce your child to the work of William Shakespeare in this gorgeous treasury for all the family to enjoy. By expertly reimagining eight of the Bard’s most famous plays, Dr Farah Karim-Cooper breathes new life into these well-loved works, making them highly engaging for a new generation of fans.Including child-friendly summaries of eight renowned Shakespeare plays:Romeo and JulietMacbethThe Tragedy of Hamlet, the Prince of DenmarkA Midsummer Night’s DreamAs You Like ItThe Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of VeniceThe TempestThe Merchant of VeniceAdditional features:Fun facts about the life and times of Shakespeare, plus interesting information on how they created the sounds and smells in The Tempest, and the magic and fairies in A Midsummer Night’s DreamBeautifully illustrated throughout, with charming representations of popular characters and scenes from each playA fantastic educational gift for children aged 7-11 or a brilliant classroom resource, created to instil artistic passion in a new generation of theatre enthusiastsWith insightful and engaging storytelling combined with historical context and key themes for each play, readers will discover how Shakespeare gives us tools to think about the world today – and realise that Shakespeare really is for everyone, across every age group and time period!

From 1997 Shakespeare's Globe flourished once more on London's South Bank after an absence of 400 years. The playhouse is now a major attraction for theatregoers, scholars, tourists, teachers and students of all ages who come to experience Shakespeare's plays and those of his contemporaries performed in their original conditions. The team of artists and education specialists who made this happen come together here to reflect on their 10-year experiment. Principal actors, designers, musicians and Globe Education staff engage with international scholars in a lively debate about the impact of this extraordinary building. Featuring an in-depth interview with former Artistic Director Mark Rylance and a contribution from Patrick Spottiswoode, Founder and Director of Globe Education, the book highlights the complex relationship between designer, composer, actor and audience which gives energy to this thriving Shakespearean centre.

CHOSEN AS ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: TIME, NPR, The New Yorker, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers WeeklyAs we witness monuments of white Western history fall, many are asking how is Shakespeare still relevant? Professor Farah Karim-Cooper has dedicated her career to the Bard, which is why she wants to take the playwright down from his pedestal to unveil a Shakespeare for the twenty-first century. If we persist in reading Shakespeare as representative of only one group, as the very pinnacle of the white Western canon, then he will truly be in peril. Combining piercing analysis of race, gender and otherness in famous plays from Antony and Cleopatra to The Tempest with a radical reappraisal of Elizabethan London, The Great White Bard asks us neither to idealize nor bury Shakespeare but instead to look him in the eye and reckon with the discomforts of his plays, playhouses and society. In inviting new perspectives and interpretations, we may yet prolong and enrich his extraordinary legacy.

SHAKESPEARE: increasingly irrelevant or lone literary genius of the Western canon?'Powerful and illuminating' James Shapiro, author of 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, winner of the Baillie Gifford 'Winner of Winners' 2023Professor Farah Karim-Cooper grew up loving the Bard, perhaps because Romeo and Juliet felt Pakistani to her. But why was being white as a ‘snowy dove’ essential to Juliet’s beauty?Combining piercing analysis of race, gender and otherness in beloved plays from Othello to The Tempest with a radical reappraisal of Elizabethan London, The Great White Bard entreats us neither to idealise nor to fossilise Shakespeare but instead to look him in the eye and reckon with the discomforts of his plays, playhouses and society.If we persist in reading Shakespeare as representative of only one group, as the very pinnacle of the white Western canon, then he will truly be in peril. But if we dare to bring Shakespeare down from his plinth, we might unveil a playwright for the twenty-first century. We might expand and enrich his extraordinary legacy. We might even fall in love with him all over again.***A TIME MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023'Insightful, passionate, piled with facts and has a warm, infectious love for theatre and Shakespeare running through every chapter.' ADRIAN LESTER, CBE'Dive in and your whole cultural landscape will be refreshed and reframed... A challenging, riveting read, The Great White Bard reminds us how powerful the stories we tell can be on our lives.' ADJOA ANDOH'Vivid… a thorough analysis but also a kind of love letter… Karim-Cooper sees Shakespeare as holding a mirror to this society, with his plays interrogating live issues around race, identity and the colonial enterprise… Her arguments come to feel essential and should be absorbed by every theatre director, writer, critic, interested in finding new ways into the work.’ GUARDIAN'There are plenty of books on Shakespeare: but this one is different. This is Shakespeare as we’ve (most of us) never been willing to see him – and the works emerge from the analysis as newly complicit, powerful and yet recuperative.' EMMA SMITH, AUTHOR OF PORTABLE MAGIC

SHAKESPEARE: increasingly irrelevant or lone literary genius of the Western canon?'Powerful and illuminating' James Shapiro, author of 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, winner of the Baillie Gifford 'Winner of Winners' 2023Professor Farah Karim-Cooper grew up loving the Bard, perhaps because Romeo and Juliet felt Pakistani to her. But why was being white as a ‘snowy dove’ essential to Juliet’s beauty?Combining piercing analysis of race, gender and otherness in beloved plays from Othello to The Tempest with a radical reappraisal of Elizabethan London, The Great White Bard entreats us neither to idealise nor to fossilise Shakespeare but instead to look him in the eye and reckon with the discomforts of his plays, playhouses and society.If we persist in reading Shakespeare as representative of only one group, as the very pinnacle of the white Western canon, then he will truly be in peril. But if we dare to bring Shakespeare down from his plinth, we might unveil a playwright for the twenty-first century. We might expand and enrich his extraordinary legacy. We might even fall in love with him all over again.***A TIME MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023'Insightful, passionate, piled with facts and has a warm, infectious love for theatre and Shakespeare running through every chapter.' ADRIAN LESTER, CBE'Dive in and your whole cultural landscape will be refreshed and reframed... A challenging, riveting read, The Great White Bard reminds us how powerful the stories we tell can be on our lives.' ADJOA ANDOH'Vivid… a thorough analysis but also a kind of love letter… Karim-Cooper sees Shakespeare as holding a mirror to this society, with his plays interrogating live issues around race, identity and the colonial enterprise… Her arguments come to feel essential and should be absorbed by every theatre director, writer, critic, interested in finding new ways into the work.’ GUARDIAN'There are plenty of books on Shakespeare: but this one is different. This is Shakespeare as we’ve (most of us) never been willing to see him – and the works emerge from the analysis as newly complicit, powerful and yet recuperative.' EMMA SMITH, AUTHOR OF PORTABLE MAGIC

Shakespeare's company, the King's Men, played at the Globe, and also in an indoor theatre, the Blackfriars. The year 2014 witnessed the opening of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, based on seventeenth-century designs of an indoor London theatre and built within the precincts of the current Globe on Bankside. This volume, edited by Andrew Gurr and Farah Karim-Cooper, asks what prompted the move to indoor theatres, and considers the effects that more intimate staging, lighting and music had on performance and repertory. It discusses what knowledge is required when attempting to build an archetype of such a theatre, and looks at the effects of the theatre on audience behaviour and reception. Exploring the ways in which indoor theatre shaped the writing of Shakespeare and his contemporaries in the late Jacobean and early Caroline periods, this book will find a substantial readership among scholars of Shakespeare and Jacobean theatre history.

Shakespeare's company, the King's Men, played at the Globe, and also in an indoor theatre, the Blackfriars. The year 2014 witnessed the opening of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, based on seventeenth-century designs of an indoor London theatre and built within the precincts of the current Globe on Bankside. This volume, edited by Andrew Gurr and Farah Karim-Cooper, asks what prompted the move to indoor theatres, and considers the effects that more intimate staging, lighting and music had on performance and repertory. It discusses what knowledge is required when attempting to build an archetype of such a theatre, and looks at the effects of the theatre on audience behaviour and reception. Exploring the ways in which indoor theatre shaped the writing of Shakespeare and his contemporaries in the late Jacobean and early Caroline periods, this book will find a substantial readership among scholars of Shakespeare and Jacobean theatre history.

Shakespeare’s and Peele’s Titus Andronicus has had a theatrical and a critical revival in the last fifteen years; the critical revival was perhaps prompted by Jonathan Bate’s Arden edition of the play and its revision of the traditional critical account that it is an immature work and overly sensationalistic with its emphasis on non-essential violence. Recent debates and approaches have drawn closer attention to the play’s classicism; re-defined its genre (for example the revised edition of the New Dramatic Sources will re-classify the play as one of Shakespeare’s Roman plays); re-considered the nature of violent spectacle, family relations and kinship, political alliance, race and miscegenation. This study will explore how the revitalized critical responses to early modern and contemporary performance histories has had a significant impact upon the wider reception of this play.

Shakespeare''s and Peele''s Titus Andronicus has had a theatrical and a critical revival in the last fifteen years; the critical revival was perhaps prompted by Jonathan Bate''s Arden edition of the play and its revision of the traditional critical account that it is an immature work and overly sensationalistic with its emphasis on non-essential violence. Recent debates and approaches have drawn closer attention to the play''s classicism; re-defined its genre (for example the revised edition of the New Dramatic Sources will re-classify the play as one of Shakespeare''s Roman plays); re-considered the nature of violent spectacle, family relations and kinship, political alliance, race and miscegenation. This study will explore how the revitalized critical responses to early modern and contemporary performance histories has had a significant impact upon the wider reception of this play.

Shakespeare''s and Peele''s Titus Andronicus has had a theatrical and a critical revival in the last fifteen years; the critical revival was perhaps prompted by Jonathan Bate''s Arden edition of the play and its revision of the traditional critical account that it is an immature work and overly sensationalistic with its emphasis on non-essential violence. Recent debates and approaches have drawn closer attention to the play''s classicism; re-defined its genre (for example the revised edition of the New Dramatic Sources will re-classify the play as one of Shakespeare''s Roman plays); re-considered the nature of violent spectacle, family relations and kinship, political alliance, race and miscegenation. This study will explore how the revitalized critical responses to early modern and contemporary performance histories has had a significant impact upon the wider reception of this play.

Yukio Ninagawa (1935–2016) was Japan's foremost director of Shakespeare whose productions were acclaimed around the world. His work was lauded for its spectacular imagery, its inventive use of Japanese iconography and its striking fusion of Eastern and Western theatre traditions.Over a career spanning six decades, Ninagawa directed 31 of Shakespeare's plays, many of them, including Hamlet, on multiple occasions. His productions of Macbeth, The Tempest, Pericles, Twelfth Night and Cymbeline became seminal events in world Shakespeare production during the last 30 years.This is the first English-language book dedicated exclusively to Ninagawa’s work. Featuring an overview of his extraordinary output, this study considers his Shakespearean work within the context of his overall career. Individual chapters cover Ninagawa’s approach Shakespeare and Greek tragedy, in particular his landmark productions of Macbeth and Medea, and his eight separate productions of Hamlet. The volume includes a detailed analysis of the Sai-no-Kuni Shakespeare Series – in which Ninagawa set out to stage all of Shakespeare’s plays in his hometown of Saitama, north of Tokyo. Written by Conor Hanratty, who studied with Ninagawa for over a year, it offers a unique and unprecedented glimpse into the work and approach of one of the world’s great theatre directors.

This volume examines the pioneering work of Phyllida Lloyd, whose all-female productions have revolutionised how Shakespeare’s plays are performed in 21st-century Britain.Following Lloyd from her first Shakespeare in Cheltenham in 1986, this book explores her radical casting practices and the importance of her collaborative rehearsal approach. While her 2003 all-female Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare’s Globe was met with both enthusiasm and resistance, it was her production of Julius Caesar in 2012 at the Donmar Warehouse which sent shock waves through the theatre industry. Alongside Henry IV in 2014 and a new production of The Tempest, Lloyd produced these plays together to create the Donmar Trilogy of 2016 to wide acclaim, a cultural landmark moment in which non-traditional casting had become mainstream.The book explores Lloyd’s ongoing relationships with major stars – Harriet Walter, Janet McTeer, Meryl Streep – and includes new interviews with both Lloyd and actors she has worked with across the last 40 years. It argues that Lloyd’s megamusical Mamma Mia! had a crucial impact on her directing practice, helping to pave the way for the Donmar Shakespeares. Ultimately Schafer and Bullen show that Lloyd’s career-long commitment to creating disturbance and diversity through her work has opened up what she calls the ‘crown jewels’ of British theatre – Shakespeare – to new audiences.

Shakespeare’s and Peele’s Titus Andronicus has had a theatrical and a critical revival in the last fifteen years; the critical revival was perhaps prompted by Jonathan Bate’s Arden edition of the play and its revision of the traditional critical account that it is an immature work and overly sensationalistic with its emphasis on non-essential violence. Recent debates and approaches have drawn closer attention to the play’s classicism; re-defined its genre (for example the revised edition of the New Dramatic Sources will re-classify the play as one of Shakespeare’s Roman plays); re-considered the nature of violent spectacle, family relations and kinship, political alliance, race and miscegenation. This study will explore how the revitalized critical responses to early modern and contemporary performance histories has had a significant impact upon the wider reception of this play.

Drawing on interview material, current scholarship and documents from the Ku Na'uka and SPAC archives, this book is the first major appraisal of Miyagi's 30-year career as one of Japan's leading directors of Shakespeare. It provides an in-depth critique of Miyagi's approach to directing Shakespeare through studies of his highly visual and physical renditions of Hamlet (1990/2008/2021), Macbeth (2001), Othello (2005/2018), A Midsummer Night's Dream (2011) and The Winter's Tale (2016). The book also discusses recent shifts in Miyagi's direction as a result of the global pandemic, and includes interviews with Miyagi, Micari (lead actress and long-time collaborator), and Hiroko Tanakawa (Miyagi's music director), making it a valuable resource for anyone interested in contemporary Japanese theatre and Shakespeare.Satoshi Miyagi (1959-) rose to prominence in Japanese theatre in the early 1990s with a series of visually striking adaptations of classical European and Asian plays. This study examines how, working with his Tokyo based Ku Na'uka Theatre Company, he developed his renowned 'mover/speaker' acting method as a means of exploring the non-linguistic aspects of theatre. It details how, in 2007, he replaced Tadashi Suzuki as the artistic director of the Shizuoka Performing Arts Centre (SPAC), where he set to work on what he terms 'the restoration of poetry' and 'weak theatre,' in sum an aesthetics that challenges the privileging of masculinity in East/West theatre traditions. Shakespeare in the Theatre: Satoshi Miyagi demonstrates how Miyagi's productions have toured worldwide to great acclaim, earning him the reputation of a director capable of shedding new light on intercultural theatre, Shakespeare and gender, and the power of language.

This book examines the work of acclaimed director Tina Packer, founder of Shakespeare & Company, whose ground-breaking approach to performing Shakespeare has made her company among the most vibrant and enduring Shakespeare theatres in America.Tina Packer directed her first Shakespeare play at London Academy for Music and Dramatic Art in 1971. More than 50 years later she continues to direct and teach at Shakespeare & Company, which she founded in Lenox, Massachusetts in 1978. Drawing on new interviews with the original casts and creative teams as well as Tina Packer herself, this book is the first comprehensive analysis of all of her professional Shakespeare productions in their cultural and historical context.Over a career that spans 5 decades, Packer has directed or acted in virtually all of Shakespeare's plays, along with many other classical and contemporary works. As artistic director she guided her company through times of expansion as well as belt-tightening, driven by her conviction that the purpose of theatre is to heal and that to fulfil that purpose, acting must tell the truth. With in-depth case studies of 12 of her most significant productions, Katharine Goodland offers a clear account of Packer’s work and contribution to Shakespearean theatre in America while illuminating the embedded nature of regional Shakespeare in communities across the United States.

This book examines the work of acclaimed director Tina Packer, founder of Shakespeare & Company, whose ground-breaking approach to performing Shakespeare has made her company among the most vibrant and enduring Shakespeare theatres in America.Tina Packer directed her first Shakespeare play at London Academy for Music and Dramatic Art in 1971. More than 50 years later she continues to direct and teach at Shakespeare & Company, which she founded in Lenox, Massachusetts in 1978. Drawing on new interviews with the original casts and creative teams as well as Tina Packer herself, this book is the first comprehensive analysis of all of her professional Shakespeare productions in their cultural and historical context.Over a career that spans 5 decades, Packer has directed or acted in virtually all of Shakespeare's plays, along with many other classical and contemporary works. As artistic director she guided her company through times of expansion as well as belt-tightening, driven by her conviction that the purpose of theatre is to heal and that to fulfil that purpose, acting must tell the truth. With in-depth case studies of 12 of her most significant productions, Katharine Goodland offers a clear account of Packer’s work and contribution to Shakespearean theatre in America while illuminating the embedded nature of regional Shakespeare in communities across the United States.

Yukio Ninagawa (1935–2016) was Japan's foremost director of Shakespeare whose productions were acclaimed around the world. His work was lauded for its spectacular imagery, its inventive use of Japanese iconography and its striking fusion of Eastern and Western theatre traditions.Over a career spanning six decades, Ninagawa directed 31 of Shakespeare's plays, many of them, including Hamlet, on multiple occasions. His productions of Macbeth, The Tempest, Pericles, Twelfth Night and Cymbeline became seminal events in world Shakespeare production during the last 30 years.This is the first English-language book dedicated exclusively to Ninagawa’s work. Featuring an overview of his extraordinary output, this study considers his Shakespearean work within the context of his overall career. Individual chapters cover Ninagawa’s approach Shakespeare and Greek tragedy, in particular his landmark productions of Macbeth and Medea, and his eight separate productions of Hamlet. The volume includes a detailed analysis of the Sai-no-Kuni Shakespeare Series – in which Ninagawa set out to stage all of Shakespeare’s plays in his hometown of Saitama, north of Tokyo. Written by Conor Hanratty, who studied with Ninagawa for over a year, it offers a unique and unprecedented glimpse into the work and approach of one of the world’s great theatre directors.

Kathryn Hunter is one of the most distinctive performers on the modern stage. Her shapeshifting abilities have seen her play Shakespearean roles as diverse as King Lear, Richard III, Katharina, Cleopatra, Puck, and Timon of Athens. Her role as the witches in Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth introduced her distinctive approach to Shakespeare to a wider audience, winning her the 2021 New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actress. She is also an accomplished Shakespearean director, having directed productions for theatres including Shakespeare’s Globe and the Royal Shakespeare Company. This study situates her Shakespearean work within the context of her wider career, including her Olivier award-winning work with Complicite and her frequent collaborations with Peter Brook. It is based on a series of nine interviews with Hunter that were conducted over Zoom during the 2020 lockdown, and draws upon archival material from Shakespeare’s Globe, the RSC and elsewhere.

Co-authored by the resident dramaturg at Shakespeare Theatre Company and a long-time scholarly consultant, this book chronicles how a small repertory troupe at the Folger Theatre on Capitol Hill became an internationally renowned company performing in a lavish, multi-venue performing arts centre in downtown Washington, D.C.The artistic vision and business acumen of Michael Kahn, the founding Artistic Director, largely catalyzed this transformation, but so too did the forces of neoliberalism and, more recently, globalization and new media. Accordingly, Shakespeare in the Theatre: Shakespeare Theatre Company not only examines directorial decision-making but also 3 decades of social and economic change in the nation’s capital, from the complexities of gentrification to the arts policies of successive administrations.In addition to discussions of directorial practice, this book examines the ambivalence of American theatre artists toward their British cultural inheritance. Analyses of representative productions and interviews with Kahn and his British successor, Simon Godwin, illuminate this complex relationship: one that aspires to a cosmopolitan Anglophilia while positioning classically trained American actors as worthy rivals to their counterparts at the RSC and the National Theatre of Great Britain.

This analysis of the Stratford Festival examines the full history of one of the largest and oldest dedicated centres for the performance of Shakespeare in North America.In English-speaking Canada, the Festival has become the unofficial national theatre, drawing both praise and criticism. Dividing its history into three distinct periods, the volume begins with the foundation of the company, moving through its middle years of expansion and securing stability, and ending with an exploration of staging Shakespeare in the 21st century. Through case studies of productions, covering each artistic director from Tyrone Guthrie to Antoni Cimolino, it highlights issues of national identity but also the relationship between actor and audience on the Festival’s unique thrust stage. It not only explores the work of international stars such as Christopher Plummer, but also that of longstanding company members William Hutt and Martha Henry, emphasizing the Festival's collective spirit.This book argues that the Stratford Festival holds an influential position in the theatre world generally and in the Shakespeare performance environment specifically. Initially this was because of the original stage built for its opening, but increasingly it has been due to the way that it has used Shakespeare’s work to articulate complex questions about identity and utilized technology to reach new audiences. The Festival and its collaborative working methods grew out of a particular social and political climate, and when the actors and directors who trained at the Festival took their training and its influences elsewhere, they spread its impact.

Drawing on interviews with contemporaries and his never-before-seen notebooks, this volume is the first book-length analysis on how Glen Byam Shaw’s work on Shakespeare in the 1950s reshaped the landscape of British theatre.Glen Byam Shaw was a pivotal figure in the development of Shakespearean performance in 20th-century Britain. From actor to director to army officer by 1942, his wartime experiences profoundly shaped his attitudes and understandings of Shakespeare. As Director of the Theatre at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon from 1952 to 1959, Shaw oversaw a vital post-war transition that laid the groundwork for what became the Royal Shakespeare Company. Overlooked in great part due to his own humility, this study seeks to restore the reputation and legacy of one of Britain’s most influential theatre directors.Shaw’s unique production practices and approaches, captured in the notebooks he kept on every play he directed, allow us to read his thoughts in his own words. Richards works closely with these preproduction materials, including detailed character analyses and interpretive notes on all aspects of the plays Shaw directed. A cross-section of Shaw’s productions in Stratford are examined, including Coriolanus, Troilus and Cressida, Macbeth, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Othello and Hamlet, revealing a progression of Shaw’s anti-war and anti-military readings of Shakespeare. In doing so it presents a revisionist history of the Royal Shakespeare Company, locating in Shaw's work the origins of many of its foundational principles, practices and approaches.

How did Elizabethan and Jacobean acting companies create their visual and aural effects? What materials were available to them and how did they influence staging and writing? What impact did the sensations of theatre have on early modern audiences? How did the construction of the playhouses contribute to technological innovations in the theatre? What effect might these innovations have had on the writing of plays? Shakespeare's Theatres and The Effects of Performance is a landmark collection of essays by leading international scholars addressing these and other questions to create a unique and comprehensive overview of the practicalities and realities of the theatre in the early modern period.

How did Elizabethan and Jacobean acting companies create their visual and aural effects? What materials were available to them and how did they influence staging and writing? What impact did the sensations of theatre have on early modern audiences? How did the construction of the playhouses contribute to technological innovations in the theatre? What effect might these innovations have had on the writing of plays? Shakespeare''s Theatres and The Effects of Performance is a landmark collection of essays by leading international scholars addressing these and other questions to create a unique and comprehensive overview of the practicalities and realities of the theatre in the early modern period.

How did Elizabethan and Jacobean acting companies create their visual and aural effects? What materials were available to them and how did they influence staging and writing? What impact did the sensations of theatre have on early modern audiences? How did the construction of the playhouses contribute to technological innovations in the theatre? What effect might these innovations have had on the writing of plays? Shakespeare''s Theatres and The Effects of Performance is a landmark collection of essays by leading international scholars addressing these and other questions to create a unique and comprehensive overview of the practicalities and realities of the theatre in the early modern period.

How did Elizabethan and Jacobean acting companies create their visual and aural effects? What materials were available to them and how did they influence staging and writing? What impact did the sensations of theatre have on early modern audiences? How did the construction of the playhouses contribute to technological innovations in the theatre? What effect might these innovations have had on the writing of plays? Shakespeare's Theatres and The Effects of Performance is a landmark collection of essays by leading international scholars addressing these and other questions to create a unique and comprehensive overview of the practicalities and realities of the theatre in the early modern period.

The original Blackfriars closed its doors in the 1640s, ending over half-a-century of performances by men and boys. In 2001, in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, it opened once again. The reconstructed Blackfriars, home to the American Shakespeare Center, represents an old playhouse for the new millennium and therefore symbolically registers the permanent revolution in the performance of Shakespeare. Time and again, the industry refreshes its practices by rediscovering its own history. This book assesses how one American company has capitalised on history and in so doing has forged one of its own to become a major influence in contemporary Shakespearean theatre.