Fourteen scholars who work on campus or in the theater address this issue of what it means to play offstage. With their individual definition of what "offstage" could mean, the results were, predictably, varied. They employed a variety of critical approaches to the question of what happens when the play moves into the audience or beyond the physical playhouse itself? What are the social, cultural, and political ramifications? Questions of "how" and "why" actors play offstage admit the larger "role" their production has for the world outside the theater, and hence this collection's sub-title: "The Theater As a Presence or Factor in the Real World." Among the various topics, the essays include: breaking the "fourth wall" and thereby making the audience part of the performance; the theater of political protest (one contributor staged Waiting for Godot in Zuccotti Park as part of the Occupy Wall Street protests); "landscape" or "town" theater using citizens as actors or trekking theater where the production moves among various locations in the community; the way principles of the theater can inform corporate management; the genre of semi-scripted comedy and quasi-impromptu spectacle (such as reality TV or flash mobs); digitalized performances of Shakespeare; the role of Greek Theater in the midst of the country's current economic and political crisis; how the area outside the theater became part of the performance inside Shakespeare's Globe; Timothy Leary's Psychedelic Celebrations designed to reproduce the offstage experience of LSD; WilliamVollmann's use of Noh theater to fashion a personal model and process of life-transformation; liminal theater which erases the line between onstage and off. The collection thus complements through actual performance criticism those studies that see the theater as a commentary on issues-social, political, economic; and it reverses the Editor's own earlier collection The Audience As Player, which examined interactive theater where the spectator comes onstage.

Series Information:
Routledge Literary Sourcebooks

Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England is an annual volume committed to the publication of essays and reviews related to English drama and theatre history to 1642. An internationally recognized board of scholars oversees the publication of MaRDiE. Readers who wish to deepen their understanding of early drama will find that the journal publishes wide-ranging discussions not only of plays and early performance history, but of topics relating to cultural history, as well as manuscript studies and the history of printing.

Gathered for the first time in this unique volume are plays and documents suggesting that, contrary to traditional thinking, women participated in the theatrical culture of the English Renaissance--as authors, translators, performers, spectators, and even as part-owners of theaters. "Renaissance Drama by Women" includes 4 full length plays--"Love's Victory, The Concealed Fancies, The Tragedy of Marion, " and "The Tragedy of Antonie"--along with a fragment of a translation from Seneca by Queen Elizabeth I, an occasional masque written for performance by a ladies' school before Queen Anne, and a collection of historical documents illustration many fascinating ways that women participated in a range of theatrical activity between the 1570s and 1660.

Fourteen scholars who work on campus or in the theater address this issue of what it means to play offstage. With their individual definition of what "offstage" could mean, the results were, predictably, varied. They employed a variety of critical approaches to the question of what happens when the play moves into the audience or beyond the physical playhouse itself? What are the social, cultural, and political ramifications? Questions of "how" and "why" actors play offstage admit the larger "role" their production has for the world outside the theater, and hence this collection's sub-title: "The Theater As a Presence or Factor in the Real World." Among the various topics, the essays include: breaking the "fourth wall" and thereby making the audience part of the performance; the theater of political protest (one contributor staged Waiting for Godot in Zuccotti Park as part of the Occupy Wall Street protests); "landscape" or "town" theater using citizens as actors or trekking theater where the production moves among various locations in the community; the way principles of the theater can inform corporate management; the genre of semi-scripted comedy and quasi-impromptu spectacle (such as reality TV or flash mobs); digitalized performances of Shakespeare; the role of Greek Theater in the midst of the country's current economic and political crisis; how the area outside the theater became part of the performance inside Shakespeare's Globe; Timothy Leary's Psychedelic Celebrations designed to reproduce the offstage experience of LSD; WilliamVollmann's use of Noh theater to fashion a personal model and process of life-transformation; liminal theater which erases the line between onstage and off. The collection thus complements through actual performance criticism those studies that see the theater as a commentary on issues-social, political, economic; and it reverses the Editor's own earlier collection The Audience As Player, which examined interactive theater where the spectator comes onstage.

The purpose of this book is to honor the scholarly legacy of Charles R. Forker with a series of essays that address the problem of literary influence in original ways and from a variety of perspectives. The emphasis throughout is on the sort of careful, exhaustive, evidence-based scholarship to which Forker dedicated his entire professional life. Although wide-ranging and various by design, the essays in this book never lose sight of three discrete yet overlapping areas of literary inquiry that create a unity of perspective amid the diversity of approaches: 1) the formation of play texts, textual analysis, and editorial practice; 2) performance history and the material playing conditions from Shakespeare's time to the present, including film as well as stage representations; and 3) the world, both cultural and literary, in which Shakespeare and his contemporaries worked and to which they bequeathed an artistic legacy that continues to be re-interpreted and re-defined by a whole new set of cultural and literary pressures. Eschewing any single, predetermined ideological perspective, the essays in this book call our attention to how the simplest questions or observations can open up provocative and unexpected scholarly vistas. In so doing, they invite us into a subtly re-configured world of literary influence that draws us into new, often unexpected, ways of seeing and understanding the familiar.

With Shylock's pound of flesh and Portia's golden ring, The Merchant of Venice is one of Shakespeare's most controversial, disturbing and unforgettable plays.
Combining accessible commentary with a range of reprinted materials, S. P. Cerasano:
*explores the contexts of the play, including early modern images of Venice, the commercialism of the play, Shakespeare's theatre and London, and images of Jewishness
*samples modern criticism of Shakespeare's Merchant, grouped into sections on The Economic Framework, Choosing and Risking, and Shylock and Other Strangers
*offers an invaluable discussion of the play in performance, considering crucial staging issues and changing interpretations of the roles of Portia and Shylock
*closely examines key passages of the work, providing both commentary and extensively annotated sections of play text
*prepares readers for additional study of the play with a useful guide to further reading.
Assuming no prior knowledge of the play, this Routledge Literary Sourcebook is the essential guide to one of the most haunting works of English drama.

Readings in Renaissance Women's Drama is the most complete sourcebook for the study of this growing area of inquiry. It brings together, for the first time, a collection of the key critical commentaries and historical essays - both classic and contemporary - on Renaissance women's drama. Specifically designed to provide a comprehensive overview for students, teachers and scholars, this collection combines:
* this century's key critical essays on drama by early modern women by early critics such as Virginia Woolf and T.S. Eliot
* specially-commissioned new essays by some of today's important feminist critics
* a preface and introduction explaining this selection and contexts of the materials
* a bibliography of secondary sources
Playwrights covered include Joanna Lumley, Elizabeth Cary, Mary Sidney, Mary Wroth and the Cavendish sisters.

Renaissance Drama By Women is a unique volume of plays and documents. For the first time, it demonstrates the wide range of theatrical activity in which women were involved during the Renaissance period. It includes full-length plays, a translated fragment by Elizabeth I, a masque, and a substantial number of historical documents. With full and up-to-date accompanying critical material, this collection of texts is an exciting and invaluable resource for use in both the classroom and research.
Special features introduced by the editors include:
* introductory material to each play
* modernized spellings
* extensive notes and annotations
* biographical essays on each playwright
* a complete bibliography
Methodically and authoritatively edited by S.P. Cerasano and Marion Wynne-Davies, Renaissance Theatre by Women is a true breakthrough for the study of women's literature and performance.

This richly documented Norton Critical Edition of Julius Caesar is based on the 1623 First Folio text. It is accompanied by a note on the text, an introduction that sets the biographical and historical stage necessary to appreciate this richly allusive play, explanatory annotations, a map, and five illustrations. "Sources and Contexts" presents possible sources as well as analogues to Julius Caesar, an account of Shakespeare's understanding of and approach to Roman history, and Ernest Schanzer's study of the narrative challenges posed by the play. "Criticism" includes early commentary-by, among others, Samuel Johnson, William Hazlitt, and Harley Granville-Barker-on Julius Caesar as well as modern interpretations. Among these are John W. Velz on role-playing in Julius Caesar; Jan H. Blits on Caesar's ambiguous end; Paul A. Cantor on rhetoric, poetry and the Roman republic; and R. A. Foakes on the themes of assassination and mob violence. "Performance History" reprints accounts of various aspects of staging Julius Caesar by Sidney Homan, John Nettles, and Robert F. Willson, Jr. A Film Bibliography and Selected Bibliography are also included.

Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England is an international journal committed to the publication of essays and reviews relevant to drama and theatre history to 1642. This issue includes eight new articles, a review essay, and reviews of nine new important books.