Shakespeare and Emotion

Shakespeare and Emotion devotes sustained attention to the emotions as a novel way of exploring Shakespeare's works in their original contexts. A variety of disciplinary approaches drawn from literary, theatrical, historical, cultural and film studies brings the recent upsurge of interest in affect into conversation with some of the most urgent debates in Shakespeare studies. The volume provides both a comprehensive account of the current state of scholarship and a speculative forum for new research. Its chapters outline some important contexts for understanding Shakespeare's creativity through an emotional lens – from religion, rhetoric, and medicine, to language, acting and Bollywood – and offer a range of case studies which reveal particular emotions at work. Considering emotional and passionate experience as an animating and sometimes alienating force within the plays and poems, the volume highlights the continuing importance of Shakespeare today: for our sense of who we are and who we might become.

Introduction Katharine A. Craik; Part I. Contexts: 1. Rhetoric: Titus Andronicus, Julius Caesar Neil Rhodes; 2. Medicine: King Lear, Macbeth, The Tempest Elizabeth D. Harvey; 3. Religion: Henry VI, Henry IV, Henry V Elizabeth Williamson; 4. Character: As You Like It, A Midsummer Night's Dream Robert White; 5. Inheritance and Innovation: Richard III, 3 Henry VI, Richard II, The Merchant of Venice Christopher Tilmouth; 6. Communities: Julius Caesar Gail Paster; 7. Audiences: Much Ado about Nothing, Measure for Measure Tanya Pollard; 8. Acting: The Taming of the Shrew, Coriolanus Bridget Escolme; 9. Bollywood: Macbeth, Othello Melissa Croteau; 10. Language: Macbeth, King Lear Philip Davis; 11. Emotional Labour: Hamlet Ross Knecht; 12. Passionate Shakespeare Peter Holbrook; Part II. Emotions: 13. Fear: Macbeth, Othello Toria Johnson; 14. Grief: Hamlet Erin Sullivan; 15. Sympathy: Titus Andronicus, The Comedy of Errors, Romeo and Juliet Richard Meek; 16. Shame: A Lover's Complaint, Coriolanus, The Rape of Lucrece Lesel Dawson; 17. Anger: Titus Andronicus, Timon of Athens Gwynne Kennedy; 18. Pride: Coriolanus Indira Ghose; 19. Happiness: Othello, I Henry IV, Antony and Cleopatra Richard Strier; 20. Love: Sonnets, As You Like It, A Midsummer Night's Dream David Schalkwyk; 21. Nostalgia: Richard II, Henry V, Henry VI Hester Lees-Jeffries; 22. Wonder: Pericles, The Tempest, 'The Phoenix and the Turtle' Tom Bishop; 23. Confusion: Cymbeline, Merchant of Venice, The Winter's Tale Timothy M. Harrison.

Katharine A. Craik is Research Lead and Reader in Early Modern Literature at Oxford Brookes University. She is the author of Reading Sensations in Early Modern England (2007), co-editor of Shakespearean Sensations: Experiencing Literature in Early Modern England (2013), and has recently published essays in Shakespeare Studies, Shakespeare Survey and Renaissance Studies. She led the Wellcome Trust funded arts project Watching on early modern sleep, and her new play Marina (with Ewan Fernie) is in development with the Royal Shakespeare Company.