Performing Shakespeare's Women: Playing Dead

by Paige Martin Reynolds

Shakespeare's women rarely reach the end of the play alive. Whether by murder or by suicide, onstage or off, female actors in Shakespeare's works often find themselves 'playing dead.' But what does it mean to 'play dead', particularly for women actors, whose bodies become scrutinized and anatomized by audiences and fellow actors who 'grossly gape on'? In what ways does playing Shakespeare's women when they are dead emblematize the difficulties of playing them while they are still alive? Ultimately, what is at stake for the female actor who embodies Shakespeare's women today, dead or alive? Situated at the intersection of the creative and the critical, Performing Shakespeare's Playing Dead engages performance history, current scholarship and the practical problems facing the female actor of Shakespeare's plays when it comes to 'playing dead' on the contemporary stage and in a post-feminist world. This book explores the consequences of corpsing Shakespeare's women, considering important ethical questions that matter to practitioners, students and critics of Shakespeare today.

208 pages, Hardcover

Published December 13, 2018

Reviews

[Stacey Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

This amazing book on Shakespeare has expanded and enriched both my approach to the written text and the performance of the plays—not only those on this book but all of them. Insightful, comprehensively researched, personable and approachable as well as satisfyingly acerbic, this book is for anyone interested in Shakespeare’s plays, their role in our shared history and their place in our collective cultural future. A simply stunning read!!

[Chloe Emmerling · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a PHENOMENAL book! The author is a past professor of mine at UCA. This book gives detailed intellect on the role of the women through out Shakespeare’s plays. Dr. Reynolds also writes how these experiences have intertwined with her own as she has played many of the women through his works. I could not praise this book enough and the thought provoking ideals she instills in the reader about what it means to be a shakespearean woman, and how it translates to us today.