Table Of ContentSHAKESPEARE MINUS ‘THEORY’
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Shakespeare Minus ‘Theory’
TOM MCALINDON
First publlshed 2004 by Ashgate Publlshing
PubJished 2016 by Routledge
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Copyright © Tom McAlindon, 2004
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Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Dara
McAlindon, T. (Thomas), 1932~
Shakespeare minus 'rheory'
1. Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 - Criticism and
interpretation 2. English drama - Early modern and
Elizabethan, 1500-1600 - History and criticism
I. Titlc
822.3'3
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McAlindon, T. (Thomas)
Shakcspcare minus 'theory' J Tom McAlindon.
p. cm.
Includcs bibliographical references.
1. Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 - Criticism and interpretation. I. Title.
PR2976.M286 2004
200365068
822.3'3~c22
ISBN 13: 978-0-7546-3981-7 (hbk)
Contents
Preface vii
Acknowledgements ix
List of Abbreviations xi
1 Taking Stock: Radical Criticism of Shakespeare 1
2 Testing New Historicism: ‘Invisible Bullets’ Reconsidered 23
3 War and Peace in Henry V 45
4 Perfect Answers: Religious Inquisition, Falstaffian Wit 77
5 Cultural Materialism and the Ethics of Reading: or, the Radicalising
of Jacobean Tragedy 87
6 Shakespearean Tragedy 105
7 Coriolanus: an Essentialist Tragedy 123
8 The Discourse of Prayer in The Tempest 137
9 Marlowe Plus and Minus ‘Theory’: the Case of Doctor Faustus 151
Notes 167
Appendix: Critiques of ‘Theory’: a Select Bibliography 191
Index 195
v
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Preface
This collection of essays seeks to defend and demonstrate a method of close
reading and historical contextualisation of Shakespeare and his contemporaries
that it has been customary of late to describe (most often derisively) as traditional
and liberal humanist, and which, although still widely practised, seldom
advertises itself as such. There is, however, a strongly oppositional thrust in the
collection. Three of the nine essays are critiques of the claims and methods of
radical, postmodernist criticism (new historicism and cultural materialism
especially); they illustrate my conviction that some leading scholars in the field
of Renaissance literature and drama, who deserve credit for shifting attention
to new areas of interest, must also be charged with responsibility for a marked
decline in standards of analysis, interpretation, and argument. I am not the first
to protest against this development, but our numbers are few. Liberal tolerance
in relation to oppositional views, respect for innovation, misplaced regard for
the political idealism of radical theory and practice, and professional prudence
have too often combined to allow parodies of rigorous scholarship to pass as
the real thing.
The remaining six essays are interpretive studies, all but one of which involve
challenges to radical readings of the plays involved. The chapter on Henry V is
much the longest, its length being due to the fact that I am here challenging a
traditional as well as radical views of the play. The concluding chapter, on
Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, is included because it gives some idea of the
thoroughness with which major non-Shakespearean texts have been forced to
fit the radical template; because it focuses on theatricality, a subject of almost
obsessive concern with many new historicists; and because it highlights
Marlowe’s (serendipitously) ironic perspective on a famous scholar’s fatally
selective reading of a key text.
vii
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Acknowledgements
For permission to reprint, I am grateful to the editors of the following journals,
in which Chapters 2, 4, 5, 7, and 8 have already appeared: Studies in Philology,
Shakespeare Survey, The Modern Language Review, The Review of English Studies,
Studies in English Literature. I am similarly indebted to Cambridge University
Press and The Gale Group for permission to reprint Chapters 6 and 9.
I would especially like to thank Rowland Wymer, Robin Headlam-Wells, James
Booth, Angela Leighton, and John Roe, whose comments on one or more of
these chapters have proved most helpful.
ix
