Rewriting Shakespeare, Rewriting OurselvesParticipants in the current debate about the literary canon generally separate the established literary order—of which Shakespeare is the most visible icon—from the emergent minority literatures. In this challenging study, Peter Erickson insists on bringing the two realms together. He asks: what impact does a revision of the literary canon have on Shakespeare's status? Part One of his book is about Shakespeare on women. In analyses of several Shakespearean works, Erickson discusses Shakespeare's ambivalence about women as a reflection of male anxiety about the cultural authority of Queen Elizabeth. Part Two is about (contemporary) women on Shakespeare. Erickson discusses Adrienne Rich's revision of the very concept of canon and discusses how several African-American women writers (in particular Maya Angelou and Gloria Naylor) have reflected on the ambivalent status of Shakespeare in their worlds. Erickson here offers a model for multicultural literary criticism and a new conceptual framework with which to discuss issues of identity politics. Rewriting Shakespeare, Rewriting Ourselves makes an important contribution to the national debate about educational policy in the humanities. |
Contents
Female Rule Patriarchal Ideology 233 | 23 |
Refracted Images of Queen Elizabeth in Venus | 31 |
The Political Effects of Gender and Class | 57 |
Gender Genre and Nation in Hamlet | 74 |
PART TWO WOMEN WRITERS REPRESENTATIONS | 93 |
The Administra | 111 |
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Adrienne Rich All's analysis androgyny Angelou Angelou's authority Berger's Bertram black women C. L. Barber California Press Cambridge canon chapter Cheney Cheney's Cocoa conflict contemporary context contrast Coppélia cult of Elizabeth cultural dramatic Dream England English Literary essay Essex Essex's device F. O. Matthiessen father female feminist criticism focus gender Gloria Naylor Hamlet Harry Berger Helena's historicism historicist identity ideology Jordan's Kermode Kermode's King Lear king's Kiswana Linden Hills literature London Lucrece's Mama Day Mama Day's ment Montrose Montrose's motif Naylor's novel overall pastoral patriarchal perspective play play's poem poem's poet Poetry political position present psychoanalytic Queen quotation Rape of Lucrece relation Renaissance revision Rewriting Rich's role sexual Shake Shakespeare Shakespeare Quarterly social Southampton specific structure Stuart Hall suggests symbolic T. S. Eliot tension tion tradition University Press Venus and Adonis white male Willow Springs women writers York