Snow by Orhan Pamuk Knopf. 426 pp. $26. Two months after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Turkish author Orhan Pamuk published an essay in the New York Review of Books (titled “The Anger of the Damned”) in which Pamuk, who is often mentioned as a contender for the Nobel Prize, tried . . . . Continue Reading »
Russ McDonald has this shrewd comment about the combination of slapstick comedy and satisfied resolution in MSND : “Even as we anticipate a happy ending, we take pleasure in watching shenanigans, pretension, and the well-aimed custard pie. This tension amounts to a contest between the end and . . . . Continue Reading »
Marjorie Garber on Midsummer Night?s Dream . 1) She begins by explaining the various connections between MSND and Romeo & Juliet , suggesting that MSND is a comic version of R&J . In both, an authority figure stands between the lovers; in both they seek satisfaction by escape; in both, the . . . . Continue Reading »
INTRODUCTION In style and form, Timon of Athens more resembles a medieval morality play than a Shakespearean tragedy. Timon is mentioned briefly in Plutarch?s life of Marc Antony and was the subject of a drama by Lucian, and by Shakespeare?s time was already a proverbial misanthrope. Shakespeare?s . . . . Continue Reading »
These comments reflect and build upon some private correspondence from James B. Jordan, August 2004. 1) Like many of Shakespeare plays, MSND works on an opposition between city and country, between the civilized world and a natural ?green world?E(Northrop Frye). Within the city, law rules, even . . . . Continue Reading »
A few notes from JE Phillips, The State in Shakespeare’s Greek and Roman Plays . 1) Phillips repeatedly points out that the play depicts corruption flowing from the highest reaches of society downward. The Senators and nobility of Athens are deeply corrupted, unable to recognize and honor . . . . Continue Reading »
Girard has tpyically provocative and stimulating things to say about Troilus & Cressida (in Theater of Envy ). 1) He focuses attention on Pandarus as a representative of ?desire made man.?EHis business is to inflame Troilus and Cressida to love, which he does through exaggerated praise of the one . . . . Continue Reading »
Scattered notes from Augostino Lombardo, ?Fragments and scraps?Ein Piero Boitani, The European Tragedy of Troilus (Clarendon, 1989). 1) Love seems to be taking hold in the midst of war at the beginning of the play, with Troilus removing his arms to win the war that takes place within him and to . . . . Continue Reading »
Marjorie Garber offers many interesting insights into the themes of Shakespeare?s Comedy of Errors in her recent Shakespeare After All . Here are several of the highlights of her analysis: 1) She points out that, like many of Shakespeare?s comedies, the crisis of Comedy of Errors is provoked by ?an . . . . Continue Reading »
I had never heard of Marilynne Robinson until I saw a review of her recently published second novel, Gilead , a few months ago in The Atlantic . That review inspired me to get a copy of her first novel, Housekeeping , which is one of the most bizarre, funny, affecting novels I have read in a long . . . . Continue Reading »
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