A History of Shakespeare on Screen : A Century of Film and Television
Editorial Reviews
Review
'The don of Shakespeare on screen has done it again. Kenneth Rothwell's History of Shakespeare on Screen is an instant classic - required reading for anyone who works on the subject, and fascinating reading for those who do not. In a tour de force, Rothwell presents an invaluable critical history of one hundred years of screened Shakespeare in 259 pages of text. One of the most important recent books on Shakespeare, it is unlikely to be surpassed.' Barbara Freedman, Shakespeare Quarterly
'For a century, Shakespeare's plays have been a goldmine of scenarios and scripts for hundreds of films, silent and otherwise, and, more recently, of television dramas. In this well-informed and wide-ranging book, at once magisterial and entertaining, Kenneth Rothwell takes us from the beginnings - Beerbohm Tree's death throes as King John (1899) - almost to the present - Baz Luhrmann's William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet (1996).' Stanley Wells, The Daily Telegraph
'[Rothwell] is an extremely compelling analyst of 'film rhetoric' - of particular technologies of style ... of details one might otherwise miss on first viewing. Written accounts of moving images are necessarily impoverished, but Rothwell, characteristically, turns even this problem to his advantage; he makes you want to see the movies yourself.' The Times Literary Supplement
Book Description
A History of Shakespeare on Screen: A Century of Film and Television chronicles how film-makers have re-imagined Shakespeare's plays in moving images from their earliest exhibition in nickelodeons to today's multi-million dollar productions shown in multiplexes. Topics covered include the silent era, Hollywood in the 1930s, the films of Laurence Olivier and Orson Welles, the transgressive cinema of Jarman and Greenaway, and the renaissance of the Shakespeare film with Kenneth Branagh in the 1990s. The book is truly international in scope, looking not only at screen adaptations in the UK and the US but also at the films of Kozintsev, Kurosawa, Zeffirelli and others. A filmography, bibliography and index of names make it invaluable as a one-volume reference work for specialists, while its accessible style will ensure that it appeals to enthusiasts and film-goers as well as to a more academic audience.
A History of Shakespeare on Screen : A Century of Film and Television,Kenneth S. Rothwell,Cambridge University Press,0521000289,English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh,Film & Video - History & Criticism,Performing Arts/Dance,Pop Arts / Pop Culture,British Isles,Films, cinema,Literary Criticism & Collections / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh,Plays & playwrights,Theatre, drama
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