Secret Shakespeare

Richard Wilson is Professor of Renaissance Literature in the Department of English at the University of Lancaster

• 1. Wrapped in a player's hide: Shakespeare's secret history2. Ghostly fathers: Shakeshafte and the Jesuits3. Secret as a dumb man: Two comedies of Italy and the genesis of secrecy4. No news but the old news: Shakespeare and the tragedy of Arden5. A bloody question: The politics of 'Venus and Adonis'6. Love in idleness: The stripping of the altars in 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'7. Dyed in mummy: 'Othello' and the mulberries8. The pilot's thumb: 'Macbeth' and the Jesuits9. Voyage to Tunis: New history and the old world of 'The Tempest'10. Unseasonable laughter: The context of 'Cardenio'11. The statute of our queen: Shakespeare's open secret12. A winter's tale: 'King Lear' in the Pennines

'But whether we can fully subscribe to all of these analogies or not, what always remains convincing is the author's understanding of the serial form and the logic of televisual storytelling, and the analyses point out instances of self-reflexivity in serial television drama with a sensitivity that is always revelatory. If we do not fail to heed the author's warnings about the real intentions of the volume, and we do not try to read the rich web of associations listed for each serial as potential sources or influences, but regard these correspondences indeed as cross-mappings, the volume will offer the reader the true pleasure of a creative and intellectual puzzle ... the volume can offer useful insights to anyone interested in adaptation studies, or who welcomes the challenge of finding traces of the Shakespeare phenomenon in contemporary culture, and most of all, it will delight readers who find pleasure in the rich and diverse world of serial drama available on quality television in the twenty-first century.'Cahiers Élisabéthains: A Journal of English Renaissance Studies