Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

The performance history of Shakespeare's first tetralogy troubles traditional wisdoms of Shakespearean theatre history, performance criticism, history itself, and even “Shakespeare,” in a variety of ways. The theatrical record is one of adaptation, serial performance, ensemble playing, and theatrical doubling which ghost the textual, authorial, and thematic doublings that haunt these plays, disrupting their unities and rendering insecure the use of Shakespeare in the construction of authorized English history and English subjects. Indeed, the infrequency with which the plays have been performed, and the degrees to which they have been adapted, may have to do with their potential to destabilize: (a) Shakespearean theatre history as the record of the performances of great (male) actors in star roles; (b) the dominant discourses of theatrical training and tradition, which focus on the creation of unified psychological character; (c) the neo-Aristotelian discourses of unified dramatic action; (d) the discourses of individual authorship and authority; and (e) the cultural role of “Shakespeare” as it relates to the construction of England as an imagined community through the policing of official history. Controversy has surrounded the dating and order of composition of these plays, and the degree to which they constitute a tetralogy. Each play excepting 1 Henry VI exists in significantly ... log in or subscribe to read full text