Shakespeare and Domestic Loss Forms of Deprivation, Mourning, and Recuperation

Examines Shakespeare's engagement with forms of deprivation which threatened domestic security in early modern England.

This 1999 book re-examines some of Shakespeare's best-known texts in the light of their engagement with the forms of deprivation which threatened domestic security in early modern England. Burglary, the loss of home, and the early deaths of parents emerge as central and very telling issues in Shakespearean drama. Heather Dubrow recovers the particular significance of home, especially in relation to gender, male and female subjectivity. She relates the plays to Shakespeare's poetry (The Rape of Lucrece), and to early modern cultural texts such as the literature of roguery; she also introduces illuminating perspectives from contemporary social problems (notably crime), twentieth-century poetry, and popular culture. One of the most vital aspects of this fascinating study is to connect concerns at the cutting edge of cultural studies (such as the construction of transgressive Others) to more traditional literary concerns such as genre, especially the workings of romance and pastoral.

1. Introduction: the circular staircase; 2. 'The forefended place': burglary; 3. 'No place to fly to': loss of dwellings; 4. 'I fear there will a worse come in his place': the early death of parents; 5. Conclusion: the art of losing; Index.

This 1999 book examines Shakespeare's engagement with the forms of deprivation which threatened domestic security in early modern England. Burglary, the loss of home, and the early deaths of parents emerge as central to Shakespeare's best-known plays and poems, related here to contemporary social problems (notably crime), and early modern cultural texts.