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The Merchant in Venice: Shakespeare in the Ghetto

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Abstract

This book records the landmark performance of The Merchant of Venice in the Venetian Ghetto in 2016, the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death and the 500th anniversary of the Jewish quarter that gave the world the word ‘ghetto’. Practitioners and critics discuss how this multi-ethnic production and its radical choice to cast five actors as Shylock provided the opportunity to respond creatively to Europe’s legacy of antisemitism, racism and difference. They observe how the place and play stand as ambivalent documents of civilization: instruments of intolerance but also sites of cultural exchange.

Keywords Venice • Aldo Finzi • Foerster • Memory • Reynaldo Hahn • Ghetto • Site-specific design • Children’s literature • The Merchant of Venice in the Ghetto • Fiction • Jews • Humanities • Directing Shakespeare • Opera • Costume design • Lighting design • The Merchant of Venice • Heritage • Laurence Olivier • Actors on Shakespeare • Performing Shakespeare • Narrativization • Rehearsal • Children reading Shakespeare • Ruth Bader Ginsburg • Aestheticism • Music design • Jessica • Site specific performance • Antisemitism • Shakespeare’s comedies of love • Charles and Mary Lamb • Josef B • Lewis Carroll • Bassanio • Music • Adapting Shakespeare • Site-specific Shakespeare • Lorenzo • The Merchant in the Ghetto • Mercy • Holocaust • Adaptation • Otto Taubmann • Shylock • Site-specific performance • Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco • Portia • Ciro Pinsuti • The quality of mercy • History • Compagnia de’ Colombari • Murray Abraham • Gratiano • Shakespeare’s trial scenes • Chromaticism • Lancelot Gobbo • Translation • Mock Appeal: Shylock v • Designing Shakespeare • Adrian Beecham • Theatre design • Antonio • Karin Coonrod • Mock Trial: Shylock v • George Braque and Shakespeare • F

Thema codes DSG • ATD • 5PX-GB-S • 1DST-IT-NVE

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-503-2 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-503-2 | ISBN (PRINT) 978-88-6969-504-9 | Numero pagine 238 | Dimensioni 16x23cm | Pubblicato 10 Giugno 2021 | Lingua en

Copyright © 2021 Shaul Bassi, Carol Chillington Rutter. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.