We will be reading eight playsthree histories from early in Shakespeare's career and five tragedies from laterand considering films of some of them. The course will approach these plays from two angles. First, we will try to see them in relation to the culture for which they were written and which they helped shape--the newly established public theater in London, prevailing notions about social class and gender, Puritan attacks on playgoing, and the like. In addition, we want to see these plays in terms of "what's in it for us"how current audiences and readers can enjoy and interpret these plays. We will be considering what the plays have to say about the authoritative institutions and discourses of their time, and how they address us now that those institutions and discourses have been replaced by others. Students will be required to attend and participate regularly, submit brief responses in class from time to time, write three prepared essays, and take a final exam.
