Course contents
Shakespeare's Macbeth has been chosen as a case study for analysing the topics of magic, power, violence and national history. The language of Shakespeare's drama will receive full attention in its multifarious aspects including metaphors, images, and rethorical figures through which themes and crucial aspects of the English world are foregrounded.Part of the lessons will be devoted to discussing the contexts where Shakespeare set his play, his literary and cultural sources, his audiences' expectations and the resonance these topics had in his own time.
A close reading of the text will provide many hints at many of these aspects and students will be asked to be familiar with it in the original.
Reccomended or required readings
Primary sources:
William Shakespeare Macbeth, ed.by K.Muir, The Arden Shakespeare, 2006. The edition provides a critical introduction and Appendixes that are part of the program. If you choose a different edition, please make sure you retrieve the Introduction and appendixes in the edition mentioned above.
Secondary sources:
Giorgio Melchiori, Shakespeare. Genesi e struttura delle opere, Bari, Laterza, 1998: “Introduzione”, pp.3-25; cap.1 “L’universo tragico”, pp.467-472; “Macbeth”, pp.499-510.
available on Google books:
Harold Bloom, “Introduction” to William Shakespeare’s Macbeth New Edition, Yale University, 2010 Bloom’s literary criticism , pp.1-6; plus one essay from the collection (of your choice)
Available on JSTOR: choose two among the following:
Mary Floyd-Wilson “English Epicures and Scottish Witches” Shakespeare Quarterly
Vol. 57, No. 2 (Summer, 2006), pp. 131-161
David L. Kranz “The Sounds of Supernatural Soliciting in "Macbeth"” Studies in Philology
Vol. 100, No. 3 (Summer, 2003), pp. 346-383
W. B. Worthen "The written troubles of the brain": "Sleep No More" and the Space of Character
Theatre Journal
Vol. 64, No. 1 (MARCH 2012), pp. 79-97
Bryan Lowrance "Modern ecstasy": Macbeth and the meaning of the political” ELH
Vol. 79, No. 4 (WINTER 2012), pp. 823-849
People who do not intend to follow the lessons are required to follow the above instruction, and to make sure they can afford to read the text in the original
as for criticism, they should read all the JSTOR articles listed above, and
Agostino Lombardo, Lettura del Macbeth, Neri Pozza, Vicenza 1983