Wednesday 4:30-7:10 p.m.
Professor Steve Cohen
This course will explore how The Tempest, one of Shakespeare’s most popular and controversial plays, has resonated through our literary and cultural history and continues to shape the way we think about such important matters as gender, race, and (post)colonialism. In addition to a careful reading of the play itself, we will look at some early modern texts that will help us situate The Tempest in the political, economic, and philosophical debates of its time. We will also explore a series of responses and adaptations in various media that show how the play has been understood, disputed, appropriated, and otherwise put to use, primarily in the twentieth century. We will be assisted by a sampling of critical articles, and students will be encouraged to further explore the play’s legacy in an area of their choosing. Selected materials in addition to Shakespeare’s play and its contexts may include works by Michel de Montaigne, Aimé Césaire, Julie Taymor, Derek Jarman, and Peter Greenaway, among others.