World-Wide Shakespeares

Drawing on debates around the global/local dimensions of cultural production, an international team of contributors explore the appropriation of Shakespeare’s plays in film and performance around the world.

In particular, the book examines the ways in which adapters and directors have put Shakespeare into dialogue with local traditions and contexts. The contributors look in turn at ‘local’ Shakespeares for local, national and international audiences, covering a range of English and foreign appropriations that challenge geographical and cultural oppositions between ‘centre’ and ‘periphery’, and ‘big-time’ and ‘small-time’ Shakespeares.

Responding to a surge of critical interest in the poetics and politics of appropriation, World-Wide Shakespeares is a valuable resource for those interested in the afterlife of Shakespeare in film and performance globally.

World-Wide Shakespeares brings together an international team of leading scholars in order to explore the appropriation of Shakespeare's plays in film and performance around the world. In particular, the book explores the ways in which adapters and directors have put Shakespeare into dialogue with local traditions and contexts.
The contributors look in turn at "local" Shakespeares for local, national and international audiences, covering a range of English and foreign appropriations that challenge geographical and cultural oppositions between "center" and "periphery," "big-time" and "small-time" Shakespeares. Their specialist knowledges of local cultures and traditions make the range of appropriations newly accessible-and newly fascinating-for world-wide readers. Drawing upon debates around the global/local dimensions of cultural production and on Pierre Bourdieu's notion of the "cultural field," the contributors together demonstrate a significant new approach to intercultural appropriations of Shakespeare.
Responding to a surge of critical interest in the poetics and politics of appropriation, World-Wide Shakespeares represents a valuable resource for those interested in the afterlife of Shakespeare in film and performance, within and beyond Anglophone cultural centers.

Sonia Massai is a Lecturer at King’s College London. She has published articles on Shakespearean appropriations and edited Titus Andronicus (New Penguin) and The Wise Woman of Hoxton (Globe Quartos). Her current projects include a book on Shakespeare and the Rise of English Drama in Print.