Migrating Shakespeare : First European Encounters, Routes and Networks

Migrating Shakespeare offers the first study of the earliest waves of Shakespeare’s migration into Europe. Charting the spread of the reception and production of his plays across the continent, it examines how Shakespeare contributed to national cultures and – in some cases – nation building. The chapters explore the routes and cultural networks through which Shakespeare entered European consciousness, from first translations to stage adaptations and critical response. The role of strolling players and actors, translators and printers, poets and dramatists, is chronicled alongside the larger political and cultural movements shaping nations. Each individual case discloses the national, literary and theatrical issues Shakespeare encountered, revealing not only how cultures have accommodated and adapted Shakespeare on their own terms but their interpretative contribution to the texts. Taken collectively the volume addresses key questions about Shakespeare’s naturalization or reluctant accommodation within other cultures, inaugurating his present global reach.

Janet Clare is Emeritus Professor of Renaissance Literature at the University of Hull, UK, and is currently Research Professor in English at the University of Bristol, UK, and Research Fellow at the Institute of English Studies, University of London, UK.

Dominique Goy-Blanquet is Professor Emeritus at the Université de Picardie and member of the editorial board of En attendant Nadeau. Her works include Shakespeare's Early History Plays (Oxford UP, 2003), Shakespeare et l'invention de l'histoire (3rd ed. Garnier, 2014), Côté cour, côté justice: Shakespeare et l'invention du droit (Garnier, 2016), essays for Shakespeare Survey, Cambridge Companion, Moreana, Law and Humanities, the editions of Joan of Arc: A Saint for all Reasons (Ashgate, 2003), Richard Marienstras's posthumous Shakespeare et le désordre du monde (Gallimard, 2012), and with François Laroque Shakespeare, combien de prétendants ? (Thierry Marchaisse, 2016). Her Shakespeare in the Theatre: Patrice Chéreau, was published by Arden/Bloomsbury in 2018.

David Schalkwyk is Director of Research at the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington D.C. and Professor of English at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He is editor of Shakespeare Quarterly and his books include Speech and Performance in Shakespeare's Sonnets and Plays (2002), Literature and the Touch of the Real (2004), Shakespeare, Love and Service (2008).

Silvia Bigliazzi is Professor of English at Verona University, Italy, where she specializes in early modern English theatre, with a focus on Shakespeare. She has published two monographs - on Hamlet and on the idea of non-being, besides translations into Italian of a number of Shakespeare's plays, including the Arden edition of Double Falsehood edited by Brean Hammond.