The Chandos Portrait

What Did Shakespeare Look Like?

The Portrait Controversy

Shakespeare I - En 355

Dr. Richard Regan

Fall 2008

Office hours: Mon 11:30-12:15, Wed 1-1:45 (in classroom), 3-4, Th 11:30-12:15

Texts: Signet Classic editions of the plays listed below.

Grading: modified contract system. Three tests and an optional paper, each of equal weight in the final grade.

Attendance: for every three cuts, a point will be deducted from your semester average. Excused absences by written note from a Dean's office, Student Services/Health Center, or your faculty advisor. Excessive absences may result in a failing grade.

Required: 1) two tests based closely on the texts of the plays; 2) weekly summaries/responses to critical articles or WWW sites. These are graded as quizzes and can raise or lower the final grade.

Modified contract: an 8-10 page paper to be eligible for a grade of A or A-. Papers may be rewritten after a conference. Topics must be in writing and approved in conference.

You should submit your papers electronically, written in Microsoft Word. Word has a feature called Track Changes which we can use to write comments on papers (in color). Click here to download a document that contains some suggestions for writing in Word and for emailing papers as attachments.

Final Exam: essays and passages for analysis.

Students with documented learning disabilities, please see me. Alternative methods of testing and evaluation are available.


Campus Cable Listings of the BBC productions


Theater related websites

Shakespeare's Globe Online

"The Elizabethan Theatre": a lecture with slides

Designing Shakespeare

Royal Shakespeare Company

Shakespeare in Performance Institute Acting Exercises

Interactive Shakespeare Project

Shakespeare at Hampton Court

Touchstone: Shakespeare in Performance


Internet MetaSites for Shakespeare

Terry Gray's Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet

SH:in:E

Encyclopaedia Britannica

Early Modern Literary Studies

Was Shakespeare Shakespeare? The Authorship Controversy

The Shakespeare Discussion List Archive

Shaksper Website

Teachers First

Shakespeare and Other Writers

Polydore Vergil's Anglica Historica (1555)

Surfing with the Bard


Podcasts (allow several minutes for download)

Shakespeare for Today (55 minutes)

Professor Ronald Rebholtz, Stanford University, Reunion Homecoming 2004
http://itunes.stanford.edu/

American Shakespeare Center

The ASC offers a number of different podcasts, including This Week at the Blackfriars, the Blackfriars Backstage Pass, the American Shakespeare Center Chronicles, and Doctor Ralph Reveals All.
You can find links to all of these podcasts at the American Shakespeare Center's Podcast Central; you can also subscribe to all ASC podcasts through the iTunes Music Store Podcast Directory, or through any number of web-based podcasting sites, including Podcast Pickle.

American Shakespeare Center (Blackfriars Playhouse)

Podcast Central


Here are the instructions for viewing the Class pages and video clips. You'll need a password from Dr. Regan: rjregan@mail.fairfield.edu

Streaming video is a part of the course because I've written classes to be interactive with excerpts from performances. You will need a broadband internet connection. Cable or DSL will work. Satellite is probably OK too. Dialup is too slow for video.

As you scroll down the course page, for each of the plays you will see a link called "Click." That will take you to the Class, and when you click on a video clip you will see a password box. The password will be given out in class, a security measure because the TEACH Act passed by Congress in 2002 allows only enrolled students to have access to copyrighted materials for educational purposes. Our method of streaming will open the clip on your computer in QuickTime, though if you are a Windows user RealPlayer may open it instead. QuickTime comes standard on Macs, and if you Windows users do not have it, you can download it (bundled with iTunes) from:

http://www.apple.com/itunes/download.

These video clips are also available from iTunes University, together with audio podcasts of our classes and some documents for each play. The clips can be expanded to full screen. Documents can be viewed as .pdf files only in iTunes, but the audio and video files can be synched to your iPod. If you are on the class roster, you have access through:

http://itunes.fairfield.edu

Enter your Stagweb ID number as your user name. The password is your Stagweb email password. This login will work as soon as the class begins.

If you are a Windows user, you can get iTunes free at:

http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/ (scroll to the Windows links)


Schedule

Week of:

September 1 - Introduction, Theory of Comedy, The Taming of the Shrew

 

Read the Works of Shakespeare at MIT

Open Source Shakespeare

Shakespeare Searched

The Internet Shakespeare Editions

RhymeZone Shakespeare Search Engine

Life in Elizabethan England

Shakespeare's Education

An Early Modern Chronology

 


September 8 - The Taming of the Shrew

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Mack, Greer, Bamber, and Slights

"Personations: The Taming of the Shrew..."

"'Caparisoned like the horse': Tongue and Tail in Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew"

The Works of the Bard: including a SEARCH engine

Scanning Shakespeare's Lines

Shakespeare: Subject to Change (Cable in the Classroom)


September 15 - Richard III

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Rossiter and Kahn

CLICK to go to the class on the play.

 

Richard III Onstage and Off

Richard III Society Online Library

Thomas More's "The History of King Richard III"

"The Misogyny of Richard III..."

Polydore Vergil's account (1555)


September 22 - Love's Labor's Lost

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Frye and David

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

The Making of Love's Labour's Lost

Studio Production Notes

Ken Branagh Interview

"'O base and obscure vulgar!': Popular Theatre and the Performance of the First Scene of Love's Labour's Lost"

"...the Nature of Shakespearian Comedy"

Women in Shakespeare


September 29 -

EXAM

Introduction to the second tetralogy: Richard II

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the article by Altick

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

"Derek Jacobi's Richard II: Ambiguities Answered"

"Historicising Shakespeare's Richard II: Current Events, Dating, and the Sabotage of Essex"

Polydore Vergil's version


October 6 - Richard II


Read: the articles by Traversi, Schoenbaum, and Holderness

PAPER TOPICS DUE

“'I Live With Bread Like You': Forms of Inclusion in Richard II"

"Shakespeare's Pacifism"


October 13 - Henry IV, Part One


(no class Monday; Monday schedule meets on Tuesday)

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Ornstein and Goldman

CLICK to go to the class on the play.

"The Education of a Prince"

"The Prudence and Kinship of Prince Hal..."

Polydore Vergil's account

 


October 20 - excerpts from Henry IV, Part Two and Henry V (entire)

"The Prudence and Kinship of Prince Hal..."

"Hal Imitates the Sun"


October 27 - Henry V



EXAM

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the article by Collimore/Sinfield

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

"The Myth of Henry V"

"Holy War in Henry Fifth"

Polydore Vergil's account

 


November 3 -

Romeo and Juliet

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Goldman, Snyder, and Novy

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

The Film Website for Romeo and Juliet

"Shakespeare and the Tragic Virtue"

PAPERS DUE


November 10 - A Midsummer Night's Dream

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Myers, Bamber, and Slights

CLICK to go to the class on the play.

 

"...Petrarch and Pyramus in the Woods of Athens"

A Study Guide to A Midsummer Night's Dream


November 17- A Midsummer Night's Dream

A Midsummer Night's Web and MOO

A Hypertext Version of A Midsummer Night's Dream


November 24 - The Merchant of Venice

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Bamber and Smallwood

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

Shakespeare and Anti-Semitism: The Question of Shylock

Trevor Nunn's Merchant

"Redeeming Shylock"

"A Second Daniel: The Jew and the 'True Jew' in The Merchant of Venice"

"Law and Love in The Merchant of Venice"

"Shylock Is Us"

"Contract in The Merchant of Venice" (Project Muse access)

Excerpt from Sir Thomas More, II, ii


Articles and reviews pertinent to the Radford/Pacino film

"A very Jewish villain"

The Merchant of Venice -Interview with director and screenwriter Michael Radford

Shylock and History

Shylock on Appeal

"Shylock’s isolation as character mirrors Shakespeare’s isolation as author"


"Sanitizing Merchant: Pacino Plays Shylock Like a Grouchy Tevya"


THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY


 

December 1 - Much Ado About Nothing

Read: the play and the Signet Introduction, and the articles by Stauffer and Neely

CLICK to go to the Class on the play.

"Bringing Deformed Forth: Engendering Meaning in Much Ado About Nothing"

"The Role of the Clown in Shakespeare's Theater"


December 8 - Conclusion


FINAL EXAM:

Saturday, December 20 @ 9 am


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