The first collected “Shakespeare Apocrypha”

The anonymous plays Mucedorus, The Merry Devil of Edmonton, and Fair Em derive their spurious attribution to Shakespeare from a volume entitled "Shakespeare Vol. 1" that once belonged to David Garrick. Despite its significance, this volume has not been studied for over two hundred years. This note corrects two longstanding errors concerning the volume's provenance and constitution, dating it to the 1630s and revealing that the volume contained eight plays, rather than the three usually assumed. Drawing out the implications of this information, Kirwan argues that the volume thus represents the first attempt to compile a volume of Shakespearean dubitanda. Situating the volume between the Pavier project and the Chetwynd Third Folio, he suggests that it implies an earlier and more sustained period of instability in the formation of the Shakespeare canon than is usually believed, and that even before the closure of the theatres, perceptions of the constitution of the Shakespeare canon were already unfixed

The Shakespeare apocrypha and canonical expansion in the marketplace

An essay is presented on the marketing of William Shakespeare's literary works. It offers a discussion on the process of canonization and examines the theatrical production "Double Falsehood," by Lewis Theobald. The author also reflects on the critical reassessment of Lukas Erne on Shakespeare's popularity in more than 45 editions between 1584-1616

"You have no voice!": Constructing reputation through contemporaries in the Shakespeare biopic

This article addresses the construction of Shakespearean reputation and legacy in contemporary film through re-evaluation of the much-derided Anonymous (Roland Emmerich, 2011), in addition to John Madden's Shakespeare in Love (1998). In both films, the framing, presentation and performance of Shakespeare's contemporaries (Jonson, Marlowe, Nashe, Dekker and Webster) is key to an understanding of how both films figure what it means to be "Shakespeare" and what it means to be "not-Shakespeare". Viewing Shakespeare and his work through the eyes of his fellow writers, the films position Shakespearean reputation as formed both by and in spite of the observations of his friends and rivals. In performing Shakespeare's contemporaries, writers and work are elided to create simple caricatures that contrast directly with the expectations of Romantic genius established for Shakespeare. In the cases of Marlowe and Jonson, however, more complex associations between competing literary legacies are brought into play that problematise the nature of the Shakespearean legacy. Emmerich's film, in seeking to rewrite the history of "Shakespeare", employs Jonson as its protagonist in order to question the nature of memorialisation, recognition and connoisseurship in preference to unquestioning fandom. In so doing, Anonymous provides a model for understanding the anti-Stratfordian experience through the overshadowing of other early modern dramatists

Insurance: Liability of Insurance Company for Refusal to Settle within Policy Limits (Crisi v. Security Ins. Co., 58 Cal. Rptr. 13, 426 P.2d 173, 1967)

Recent Decision

Consuming the Royal Body: Stillness, Scopophilia, and Aura in Lear and Macbeth on Screen

Drawing on Hilary Mantel's evocation of the frozen body of the monarch as an object to be gazed upon and consumed, this article revisits three cinematic Shakespearean films in order to demonstrate the ways in which kings are made abject. By applying Laura Mulvey's language of scopophilia to instances in Ran (Kurosawa, 1985), King Lear (Brook, 1971), and Macbeth (Kurzel, 2015) where kings are framed as still, this article sees royal bodies at the mercy of the camera. In their stillness and fragmentation, especially at moments of trauma, these bodies both draw the gaze of the camera while at the same time being subject to exploitation by it. Further, by applying an ecocritical framework, this article argues that these bodies are consumed both by and along with the landscape as well as the camera, aligning the fate of the abject king with the fate of the land they inhabit, if not rule. Through reframing the relationship between Shakespearean screen monarchs, the filmed environment, and the camera as one of hungry scrutiny, the article concludes that the power relationships of Shakespearean tragedy are open to subversion