Shakespeare and the Soliloquy in Early Modern English Drama

Encompassing nearly a century of drama, this is the first book to provide students and scholars with a truly comprehensive guide to the early modern soliloquy. Considering the antecedents of the form in Roman, late fifteenth and mid-sixteenth century drama, it analyses its diversity, its theatrical functions and its socio-political significances. Containing detailed case-studies of the plays of Marlowe, Shakespeare, Jonson, Ford, Middleton and Davenant, this collection will equip students in their own close-readings of texts, providing them with an indepth knowledge of the verbal and dramaturgical aspects of the form. Informed by rich theatrical and historical understanding, the essays reveal the larger connections between Shakespeare's use of the soliloquy and its deployment by his fellow dramatists.

Offers a new history of the early modern soliloquy, unparalleled in its scope
Provides detailed case-studies of key playwrights
Close-readings will enable both literature students and theatre studies students to grasp the verbal and dramaturgical aspects of the form

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‘… scholars and teachers of early modern drama will find Shakespeare and the Soliloquy in Early Modern English Drama a valuable resource that furthers our understanding of the uses of this important rhetorical device.’ Emily Shortslef, Renaissance Quarterly

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Product details

Published: June 2022
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781316623893
Length: 288 pages
Dimensions: 228 × 150 × 16 mm
Weight: 0.43kg
Availability: Available

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Contents

Introduction A.D. Cousins and Daniel Derrin
1. Roman soliloquy Joseph A. Smith
2. Tudor transformations Raphael Falco
3. Doubtful battle: Marlowe's soliloquies Liam Semler
4. Shakespeare and the female voice in soliloquy Catherine Bates
5. Contemplative idiots in soliloquy: rhetorical parody, laughable deformity and the audience Daniel Derrin
6. Giving voice to history in Shakespeare David Bevington
7. Hamlet and of truth: humanism and the disingenuous soliloquy A. D. Cousins
8. Choosing between shame and guilt: Macbeth, Othello, Hamlet and King Lear Patrick Gray
9. 'Too hot, too hot': the rhetorical poetics of soliloquies in Shakespeare's late plays Kate Aughterson
10. Ben Jonson's Roman soliloquies James Loxley
11. Ben Jonson's comic selves Brian Woolland
12. 'In such a whisp'ring and withdrawing hour': speaking solus in Middleton's The Revenger's Tragedy and the Lady's Tragedy Andrew Hiscock
13. John Ford's soliloquies: solitude interrupted Huw Griffiths
14. Davenant's Macbeth: soliloquy, counter-revolution, and restoration Dani Napton and A. D. Cousins
15. What were soliloquies in plays by Shakespeare and other late Renaissance dramatists? An empirical approach James Hirsh
Select Bibliography
Index.

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Contributors

A. D. Cousins, Daniel Derrin, Joseph A. Smith, Raphael Falco, Liam Semler, Catherine Bates, David Bevington, Patrick Gray, Kate Aughterson, James Loxley, Brian Woolland, Andrew Hiscock, Huw Griffiths, Dani Napton, James Hirsh

Editors

A. D. Cousins , Macquarie University, Sydney
A. D. Cousins is a fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and a member of the Order of Australia. He has published fifteen books in America and England, including monographs on Andrew Marvell, Thomas More, Shakespeare's non-dramatic verse, and religious verse of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He has been a visiting adjunct professor at the Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies Center at the University of Massachusetts, a visiting scholar at Princeton University and at Pennsylvania State University, and a library fellow at the Library of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He holds doctorates in both English literature and political theory.
Daniel Derrin , Durham University
Daniel Derrin is a research fellow in the Department of English Studies at Durham University. He has published in the areas of early modern rhetorical theory, drama, comedy, Shakespeare, and the writing of John Donne. He was awarded the S. Ernest Sprott fellowship for 2014–15 from the University of Melbourne, which was completed at the Warburg Institute, and has been an associate investigator for the Australian Research Council's Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions.

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