A Feminist Companion to Shakespeare

The question is not whether Shakespeare studies needs feminism, but whether feminism needs Shakespeare. This is the explicitly political approach taken in the dynamic and newly updated edition of A Feminist Companion to Shakespeare.

• Provides the definitive feminist statement on Shakespeare for the 21st century
• Updates address some of the newest theatrical andcreative engagements with Shakespeare, offering fresh insights into Shakespeare’s plays and poems, and gender dynamics in early modern England
• Contributors come from across the feminist generations and from various stages in their careers to address what is new in the field in terms of historical and textual discovery
• Explores issues vital to feminist inquiry, including race, sexuality, the body, queer politics, social economies, religion, and capitalism
• In addition to highlighting changes, it draws attention to the strong continuities of scholarship in this field over the course of the history of feminist criticism of Shakespeare
• The previous edition was a recipient of a Choice Outstanding Academic Title award; this second edition maintains its coverage and range, and bringsthe scholarship right up to the present day

Notes on Contributors x

Preface to the Second Edition xvii

Introduction 1
Dympna Callaghan

Part I The History of Feminist Shakespeare Criticism 19

1 The Ladies’ Shakespeare 21
Juliet Fleming

2 Margaret Cavendish, Shakespeare Critic 39
Katherine M. Romack

3 Misogyny Is Everywhere 60
Phyllis Rackin

Part II Text and Language 75

4 Feminist Editing and the Body of the Text 77
Laurie E. Maguire

5 “Made to write ‘whore’ upon?”: Male and Female Use of the Word “Whore” in Shakespeare’s Canon 98
Kay Stanton

6 “A word, sweet Lucrece”: Confession, Feminism, and The Rape of Lucrece 121
Margo Hendricks

Part III Social Economies 137

7 Gender, Class, and the Ideology of Comic Form: Much Ado about Nothing and Twelfth Night 139
Mihoko Suzuki

8 Gendered “Gifts” in Shakespeare’s Belmont: The Economies of Exchange in Early Modern England 162
Jyotsna G. Singh

Part IV Race and Colonialism 179

9 The Great Indian Vanishing Trick – Colonialism, Property, and the Family in A Midsummer Night’s Dream 181
Ania Loomba

10 Black Ram, White Ewe: Shakespeare, Race, and Women 206
Joyce Green MacDonald

11 Sycorax in Algiers: Cultural Politics and Gynecology in Early Modern England 226
Rachana Sachdev

12 Black and White, and Dread All Over: The Shakespeare Theatre’s “Photonegative” Othello and the Body of Desdemona 244
Denise Albanese

Part V Performing Sexuality 267

13 Women and Boys Playing Shakespeare 269
Juliet Dusinberre

14 Mutant Scenes and “Minor” Conflicts in Richard II 281
Molly Smith

15 Lovesickness, Gender, and Subjectivity: Twelfth Night and As You Like It 294
Carol Thomas Neely

16 … in the Lesbian Void: Woman–Woman Eroticism in Shakespeare’s Plays 318
Theodora A. Jankowski

17 Duncan’s Corpse 339
Susan Zimmerman

Part VI Religion 359

18 Others and Lovers in The Merchant of Venice 361
M. Lindsay Kaplan

19 Between Idolatry and Astrology: Modes of Temporal Repetition in Romeo and Juliet 378
Philippa Berry

Part VII Character, Genre, History 393

20 Putting on the Destined Livery: Isabella, Cressida, and our Virgin/Whore Obsession 395
Anna Kamaralli

21 The Virginity Dialogue in All’s Well That Ends Well: Feminism, Editing, and Adaptation 411
Rory Loughnane

22 Competitive Mourning and Female Agency in Richard III 428
Mario DiGangi

23 Bearing Death in The Winter’s Tale 440
Amy K. Burnette

24 Monarchs Who Cry: The Gendered Politics of Weeping in the English History Play 457
Jean E. Howard

25 Shakespeare’s Women and the Crisis of Beauty 467
Farah Karim�]Cooper

Part VIII Appropriating Women, Appropriating Shakespeare 481

26 Women and Land: Henry VIII 483
Lisa Hopkins

27 Desdemona: Toni Morrison’s Response to Othello 494
Ayanna Thompson

28 Woman�]Crafted Shakespeares: Appropriation, Intermediality, and Womanist Aesthetics 507
Sujata Iyengar

29 A Thousand Voices: Performing Ariel 520
Amanda Eubanks Winkler

Index 539

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