Description
Hamlet's Moment identifies a turning point in the history of English drama and early modern political culture: the moment when the business of politics became a matter of dramatic representation. Drama turned from open, military conflict to diplomacy and court policy, from the public contestation of power to the technologies of government. Tragedies of state turned into tragedies of state servants, inviting the public to consider politics as a profession and to imagine what it meant to have a political career. By staging intelligence derived from diplomatic sources, and by inflecting the action and discourse of their plays with a Machiavellian style of political analysis, playwrights such as Shakespeare, Jonson, Chapman, Marston transformed political knowledge into a more broadly useful type of cultural capital, something even people without political agency could deploy in conversation and use in claiming social distinction. In Hamlet's moment, the public stage created the political competence that enabled the rise of the modern public sphere. The first half of the book offers a new analysis of Shakespeare's Hamlet through the lens of its use of political knowledge, while the second half broadens the scope of discussion by exploring the plays of Shakespeare's contemporaries.
About the Author
Andras Kisery is Assistant Professor of English at The City College of New York (CUNY). He is co-editor of Formal Matters: Reading the Materials of English Renaissance Literature (Manchester University Press, 2013) He has published articles about early modern English literature in the contexts of political culture and the history of the book in European Journal of English Studies, Philological Quarterly, and English Literary History. He is writing a book about the influence of the national and international topographies of the book-trade on the production and reception of early modern English writing called 'Books, Space, and English Literature'.
Reviews
A particularly appealing feature of Kisery's writing is his generous sign posting and cross-referencing, which skillfully guide the readers' attention to subtle details and connections. Despite the occasional lengthy sentences, Kisery's book is written in a lively, often entertaining, sometimes even ironic, but always lucid academic prose. ... For anyone who is interested in early modern political thought and practice, print and manuscript culture, and, above all, drama, it is worth following Kisery on his journey with these ambassadors. * Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies *
A provocative monograph from which one learns much * Nick Myers, Cahier 'Elisabe thains: A journal of English Renaissance Studies *
a painstakingly researched study of something that is incredibly hard to say something new about: Renaissance drama and politics. But Kisery does it ... Hamlet's Moment shows through a series of detailed case studies -- all of which display a sophisticated knowledge of book history, intellectual history, and literary form -- how Renaissance drama around 1600 familiarized English audiences with the emergent notion of politics as a profession. * Kevin Curran, Studies in English Literature 1500-1900 *
Hamlet's Moment is, in the best sense, a densely contextualist account of the nature and function of drama's political discourse at the turn of the seventeenth century. Acutely attentive to the most recent scholarship in early modern political history, this intellectually ambitious book sets out to "link social, intellectual, and literary history by examining the circulation of knowledge in print and manuscript, in professional and fictional forms" and to attend "to the interest in, and utility of, this circulation in a particular historical moment" (22-3). That moment, Kisery argues, was characterized by a new interest in the drama of statecraft, one that offered an entirely novel understanding of politics specifically as a profession (4; 1)...In sum, this book makes an important contribution to both literary and historical studies and proves that we really did need another book about Hamlet. * Dympna Callaghan, Shakespeare Jahrbuch *
meticulous reference to notebooks, diaries, and annotations of the play's original audience ... he also shows that Hamlet itself depicts and explores a shift in the perspective on politics from one generation to another. * Bart van Es, Times Literary Supplement *
This is a book that readers will want to ponder carefully, both for its meticulous organization of detail and for its intelligent and judicious critical synthesis of important elements of a current interdisciplinary debate in Early Modern Studies. * John Drakakis, Modern Language Review *
Book Information
ISBN 9780198746201
Author Andras Kisery
Format Hardback
Page Count 340
Imprint Oxford University Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Weight(grams) 686g
Dimensions(mm) 240mm * 162mm * 25mm
About the Author
Andras Kisery is Assistant Professor of English at The City College of New York (CUNY). He is co-editor of Formal Matters: Reading the Materials of English Renaissance Literature (Manchester University Press, 2013) He has published articles about early modern English literature in the contexts of political culture and the history of the book in European Journal of English Studies, Philological Quarterly, and English Literary History. He is writing a book about the influence of the national and international topographies of the book-trade on the production and reception of early modern English writing called 'Books, Space, and English Literature'.
Reviews
A particularly appealing feature of Kisery's writing is his generous sign posting and cross-referencing, which skillfully guide the readers' attention to subtle details and connections. Despite the occasional lengthy sentences, Kisery's book is written in a lively, often entertaining, sometimes even ironic, but always lucid academic prose. ... For anyone who is interested in early modern political thought and practice, print and manuscript culture, and, above all, drama, it is worth following Kisery on his journey with these ambassadors. * Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies *
A provocative monograph from which one learns much * Nick Myers, Cahier 'Elisabe thains: A journal of English Renaissance Studies *
a painstakingly researched study of something that is incredibly hard to say something new about: Renaissance drama and politics. But Kisery does it ... Hamlet's Moment shows through a series of detailed case studies -- all of which display a sophisticated knowledge of book history, intellectual history, and literary form -- how Renaissance drama around 1600 familiarized English audiences with the emergent notion of politics as a profession. * Kevin Curran, Studies in English Literature 1500-1900 *
Hamlet's Moment is, in the best sense, a densely contextualist account of the nature and function of drama's political discourse at the turn of the seventeenth century. Acutely attentive to the most recent scholarship in early modern political history, this intellectually ambitious book sets out to "link social, intellectual, and literary history by examining the circulation of knowledge in print and manuscript, in professional and fictional forms" and to attend "to the interest in, and utility of, this circulation in a particular historical moment" (22-3). That moment, Kisery argues, was characterized by a new interest in the drama of statecraft, one that offered an entirely novel understanding of politics specifically as a profession (4; 1)...In sum, this book makes an important contribution to both literary and historical studies and proves that we really did need another book about Hamlet. * Dympna Callaghan, Shakespeare Jahrbuch *
meticulous reference to notebooks, diaries, and annotations of the play's original audience ... he also shows that Hamlet itself depicts and explores a shift in the perspective on politics from one generation to another. * Bart van Es, Times Literary Supplement *
This is a book that readers will want to ponder carefully, both for its meticulous organization of detail and for its intelligent and judicious critical synthesis of important elements of a current interdisciplinary debate in Early Modern Studies. * John Drakakis, Modern Language Review *
Book Information
ISBN 9780198746201
Author Andras Kisery
Format Hardback
Page Count 340
Imprint Oxford University Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Weight(grams) 686g
Dimensions(mm) 240mm * 162mm * 25mm
