Shakespeare and the Nature of Love: Literature, Culture, EvolutionNorthwestern University Press, 27.08.2007 - 245 Seiten The best conception of love, Marcus Nordlund contends, and hence the best framework for its literary analysis, must be a fusion of evolutionary, cultural, and historical explanation. It is within just such a bio-cultural nexus that Nordlund explores Shakespeare’s treatment of different forms of love. His approach leads to a valuable new perspective on Shakespearean love and, more broadly, on the interaction between our common humanity and our historical contingency as they are reflected, recast, transformed, or even suppressed in literary works. After addressing critical issues about love, biology, and culture raised by his method, Nordlund considers four specific forms of love in seven of Shakespeare’s plays. Examining the vicissitudes of parental love in Titus Andronicus and Coriolanus, he argues that Shakespeare makes a sustained inquiry into the impact of culture and society upon the natural human affections. King Lear offers insight into the conflicted relationship between love and duty. In two problem plays about romantic love, Troilus and Cressida and All’s Well that Ends Well, the tension between individual idiosyncrasies and social consensus becomes especially salient. And finally, in Othello and The Winter’s Tale, Nordlund asks what Shakespeare can tell us about the dark avatar of jealousy. |
Inhalt
3 | |
17 | |
Parental Love in Two Roman Tragedies | 52 |
Filial Love in King Lear | 88 |
Romantic Love in Two Problem Plays | 125 |
Jealousy in Othello | 163 |
Conclusion | 197 |
Notes | 203 |
Works Cited | 229 |
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All’s Anatomy of Melancholy argued argument become behavior Bertram biocultural biological chapter characters child concept conflict Coppélia Cordelia Coriolanus courtly love critics cultural Darwin daughter defined definition Desdemona desire difficult discussion dispositions duty early modern Edmund emotional evolutionary evolved example expect experience explanation father feelings female figure final finally find first first act first scene fitness gender genetic Goneril Helena historical honor human nature idea ideal identifiable individual influence involves jealousy King Lear King’s Lear’s least Leontes literary literature love test love’s male marriage means moral mother normative nurturing offspring one’s Othello parental investment parental love passion person perspective political Polixenes problem psychological question reading reason reflect relationship romantic love seems sense sexual sexual selection Shakespeare Shakespeare’s play significant social species specific sufficient suggests theory thing tion Titus Andronicus Troilus and Cressida universal Volumnia Winter’s Tale women words