Philosophical Readings of Shakespeare "Thou Art the Thing Itself"

by Pascucci, Margherita

• ISBN13: 9781137335357
• ISBN10: 1137335351
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2013-05-22
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

In his plays, Shakespeare produced a new and unprecedented way of thinking about life, death, power, and their affects. Philosophical Readings of Shakespeare offers close readings of King Lear, Hamlet, Macbeth, and Timon of Athens to provide insight into the ontological discourse of poverty and money. Following Marxian thought, Margherita Pascucci shows how Shakespeare was the first to depict money as a conceptual persona. Ultimately, the book's analysis of the themes of creation, subjectivity, and value opens new reflections on central questions of our time.

Author Biography

Margherita Pascucci (MA, Columbia University, NY; PhD, NYU, NY; Doctor Philosophiae, Viadrina Universität, Germany), has been Marie Curie Fellow at Royal Holloway, UK (2008-2010), working on the English Poor Laws and the concept of poverty and money in Shakespeare.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Shakespeare and Philosophy
1. Allegory and the Combustion of Representation
2. This is I, Hamlet the Dane
3. Macbeth, multitudinous seas incarnadanine: A Grammar of Power, a Grammar of potentia
4. The Bloody Legislation
5. 'Thou art the thing itself'
6. Timon of Athens: 'Thou the common whore'
7. Conclusion