Vision and Rhetoric in Shakespeare

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xvi

   PDF

2. Alberti, As You Like It, and the Process of Invention

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 1-31

3. English Beholders and the Art of Perspective

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 32-56

4. Ut Pictura Poesis and the Rhetoric of Perspective

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 57-103

5. Hamlet and the Art of Looking Diversely on the Self

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 104-133

6. Troilus and Cressida, ‘ Imagin’d Worth’ and the ‘Bifold Authority’ of Anamorphosis

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 134-165

7. Antony and Cleopatra and the Art of Dislimning

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 166-197

8. The Tempest and the Art of Masque

   • Alison Thorne

   Pages 198-225

9. Back Matter

   Pages 226-290

   PDF

This major new interdisciplinary study argues that Shakespeare exploited long-established connections between vision, space and language in order to construct rhetorical equivalents for visual perspective. Through a detailed comparison of art and poetic theory in Italy and England, Thorne shows how perspective was appropriated by English writers, who reinterpreted it to suit their own literary concerns and cultural context. Focusing on five Shakespearean plays, she situates their preoccupation with issues of viewpoint in relation to a range of artistic forms and topics from miniatures to masques.

• argue
• art
• bibliography
• England
• English
• Hamlet
• interdisciplinary
• interpret
• Italy
• knowledge
• language
• play
• rhetoric
• space
• William Shakespeare

'There is much to admire in Vision and Rhetoric in Shakespeare, especially the chapter on Hamlet.' - Times Literarary Supplement

'...a scrupulously argued book...an extensive analysis of English and Italian aesthetic theory.' - Andrew Hadfield, Times Literary Supplement

Alison Thorne is Lecturer in English Studies at the University of Strathclyde.

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