Shakespeare's Asian Journeys: Critical Encounters, Cultural Geographies, and the Politics of Travel / Edition 1

by Bi-qi Beatrice Lei, Judy Celine Ick, Poonam Trivedi

Overview

This volume gives Asia’s Shakespeares the critical, theoretical, and political space they demand, offering rich, alternative ways of thinking about Asia, Shakespeare, and Asian Shakespeare based on Asian experiences and histories. Challenging and supplementing the dominant critical and theoretical structures that determine Shakespeare studies today, close analysis of Shakespeare’s Asian journeys, critical encounters, cultural geographies, and the political complexions of these negotiations reveal perspectives different to the European. Exploring what Shakespeare has done to Asia along with what Asia has done with Shakespeare, this book demonstrates how Shakespeare helps articulate Asianess, unfolding Asia’s past, reflecting Asia’s present, and projecting Asia’s future. This is achieved by forgoing the myth of the Bard’s universality, bypassing the authenticity test, avoiding merely descriptive or even ethnographic accounts, and using caution when applying Western theoretical frameworks. Many of the productions studied in this volume are brought to critical attention for the first time, offering new methodologies and approaches across disciplines including history, philosophy, sociology, geopolitics, religion, postcolonial studies, psychology, translation theory, film studies, and others. The volume explores a range of examples, from exquisite productions infused with ancient aesthetic traditions to popular teen manga and television drama, from state-dictated appropriations to radical political commentaries in areas including Japan, India, Taiwan, Korea, Indonesia, China, and the Philippines. This book goes beyond a showcasing of Asian adaptations in various languages, styles, and theatre traditions, and beyond introductory essays intended to help an unknowing audience appreciate Asian performances, developing a more inflected interpretative dialogue with other areas of Shakespeare studies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780367884260
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	12/10/2019
Series:	Routledge Studies in Shakespeare
Pages:	292
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Bi-qi Beatrice Lei is a research fellow at the Research Center for Digital Humanities of National Taiwan University, Taiwan.

Judy Celine Ick is Professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature of the University of the Philippines and a part-time faculty member of the Interdisciplinary Studies Department of Ateneo De Manila University, Philippines.

Poonam Trivedi is Associate Professor in English at Indraprastha College, University of Delhi, India.

Table of Contents

CONTENTS

List of Figures

Acknowledgments

Preface: On Memorials

Dennis Kennedy

Shakespeare’s Asian Journeys: An Introduction

Bi-qi Beatrice Lei

Part I: Re-Defining the Field of Asian Shakespeare

Chapter One: The Augmentation of the Indies

Judy Celine Ick

Chapter Two: Shakespeare’s Long Journey to Japan

Kawachi Yoshiko

Chapter Three: Unraveling Hamlet’s Spiritual and Sexual Journeys

Poonam Trivedi

Chapter Four: Shakespeare’s Asian Journey or "White Mask, Black Handkerchief"

Ted Motohashi

Part II: Shakespeare and Asian Politics

Chapter Five: "I may be straight, though they themselves be bevel"

Bi-qi Beatrice Lei

Chapter Six: The Great General and Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme

Shen Lin

Chapter Seven: Political Shakespeare in Korea

Kim Kang

Chapter Eight: Hijacking Shakespeare

Melani Budianta

Part III: Shakespeare and Asian Identity

Chapter Nine: Shakespeare as Cultural Capital

Ricardo G. Abad

Chapter Ten: Makyung Titis Sakti

Nurul Farhana Low bt Abdullah and A.S. Hardy Shafii

Chapter Eleven: A Journeying Shakespeare, or Adjourning Shakespeare

Brooke A. Carlson

Part IV: Asian Shakespeare and Pop Culture

Chapter Twelve: Pleasurable Errors and Erroneous Pleasures

Paromita Chakravarti

Chapter Thirteen: "The Very Basics for All of Us"

Minami Ryuta

List of Contributors

Index of Shakespeare’s Plays

Subject Index