Shakespeare and the Uses of Antiquity: An Introductory EssayAlthough a third of his plays are set in the ancient world and he constantly used classical mythology, history, and ideas, Shakespeare received a simple grammar school education and did not have a scholar's knowledge of the classics. The critical implications of this are the subject of Shakespeare and the Uses of Antiquity. Against a recent academic tendency to exaggerate Shakespeare's learning, the authors investigate how he used his comparatively restricted knowledge to create, for example, an unusually convincing picture of Rome, and analyse, by presenting us with careful readings of specific passages, the styles Shakespeare employed under the influence of classical writers, especially Ovid, Seneca, and (in translation) Homer and Plutarch. |
Other editions - View all
Shakespeare and the Uses of Antiquity: An Introductory Essay Charles Martindale No preview available - 1994 |
Shakespeare and the Uses of Antiquity: An Introductory Essay Michelle Martindale No preview available - 1994 |
Common terms and phrases
Achilles Actaeon ancient Antony Antony and Cleopatra appear argues argument audience becomes Brutus Caesar called character classical Cleopatra comes context contrast Coriolanus critics death drama edition effect Elizabethan English Essays example fact gives Greek hand heroic Homer idea Iliad imagination imitation influence interest Jonson kind language later Latin learned least less lines literature live London look lovers Macbeth manner matter means Metamorphoses mind moral moving nature op.cit original Ovid Ovid's Ovidian Oxford particular partly passage perhaps person picture Plautus play poem poet poetry political present reference Renaissance rhetorical Roman Rome scene seems seen Seneca sense Shake Shakespeare similar speech Stoic story Studies style suggests things thought Titus tradition tragedy translation Troilus turns University Press Venus verse virtue whole writing