Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare Unlimited24 Nov 2020

The Victorian Cult Of Shakespeare

For most of the 1700s, Shakespeare was considered a very good playwright. But in the 1800s, and especially during the Victorian period, Shakespeare became a prophet. Ministers began drawing their lessons from his texts. Scholars wrote books about the scriptural resonances of his words—often while taking those words out of context. Shakespeare’s works, the Victorians believed, offered religious revelations. In his new book, "The Victorian Cult of Shakespeare: Bardology in the Nineteenth Century," University of Washington Associate Professor of English Charles LaPorte examines this moment in literary and religious history. We invited him to join us on the podcast to tell us how people in the 19th century thought about Shakespeare, how the moment helped give rise to the “authorship controversy,” and how sometimes, even today, we read Shakespeare like the Victorians. LaPorte is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. "The Victorian Cult of Shakespeare: Bardology in the Nineteenth Century" was published by Cambridge University Press in 2020. Dr. Charles LaPorte's previous book, "Victorian Poets and the Changing Bible," was named Best First Book in Victorian Studies by the Northeast Victorian Studies Association in 2011. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast. Published November 24, 2020. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “I Am No Thing To Thank God On,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer, with help from Leonor Fernandez. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California.

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(305)

Shakespeare and Stephen King, with Caroline Bicks

Imagine being able to dig through Shakespeare’s manuscripts and ask him about his writing process. Did King Lear survive in the first draft? What if Hamlet originally said, “To live or not to live?” ...

28 Jul 37min

Shakespeare's Margaret, with Charles O'Malley and Scott W. Stern

It’s been more than 400 years since she first appeared on stage, and she’s still controversial. Margaret of Anjou appears in not one, not two, but four of Shakespeare’s plays—Henry VI Parts 1, 2, and ...

14 Jul 35min

Scholars in Shakespeare, with Sean Keilen

Shakespeare famously never attended university. But not only has his work inspired generations of scholarship, his plays, too, are filled with scholarly characters. Shakespeare, it seems, took an inte...

30 Jun 35min

The Six Loves of James I, with Gareth Russell

“Elizabeth was king, now James is queen.” So went the joke circulating around London in the 17th century. While Elizabeth I became an icon for transgressing traditional gender roles, her successor is ...

16 Jun 40min

Shakespeare and the Red Scare, with Marjorie Garber

“Is he a Communist?” During a House Un-American Activities Committee hearing in 1938, Congressman Joe Starnes probed into the politics of a writer produced by the Federal Theatre Project. The playwrig...

2 Jun 32min

Jacob Ming-Trent on How Shakespeare Saved My Life

One small step into the wrong classroom becomes a giant leap into a new life as a Shakespearean actor. That’s how Jacob Ming-Trent tells it in his remarkable one-man tour-de-force, How Shakespeare Sav...

19 Mai 31min

The Shakespeare Ladies Club

A century after Shakespeare’s death, his words were in danger of being forgotten. While plays like King Lear and Othello still played to packed houses across England, audiences saw only the bowdlerize...

5 Mai 27min

The Translator's Art and Shakespeare, with Daniel Hahn

Is Shakespeare still Shakespeare even if every word is changed? While Shakespeare’s work is often hailed for its universality, its meter, metaphor, and wordplay pose special challenges for translators...

21 Apr 33min