Shakespeare and Cognition

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-ix

   PDF

2. Why Characters Matter in Shakespeare’s Plays

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 1-11

3. Key Concepts: Dual-Process Theory, Heuristics and Biases

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 12-22

4. ‘Teach Me How to Flatter You’: Persuasion

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 23-35

5. Iago, Othello and Trait Ascription Bias

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 36-51

6. ‘And Reason Panders Will’: Another Look at Hamlet’s Analysis Paralysis

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 52-62

7. Concluding Note

   • Neema Parvini

   Pages 63-67

8. Back Matter

   Pages 68-75

   PDF

Shakespeare and Cognition challenges orthodox approaches to Shakespeare by using recent psychological findings about human decision-making to analyse the unique characters that populate his plays. It aims to find a way to reconnect readers and watchers of Shakespeare's plays to the fundamental questions that first animated them. Why does Othello succumb so easily to Iago's manipulations? Why does Anne allow herself to be wooed by Richard III, the man who killed her husband and father? Why does Macbeth go from being a seemingly reasonable man to a cold-blooded killer? Why does Hamlet take so long to kill Claudius? This book aims to answer these questions from a fresh perspective.

• Shakespeare
• Othello
• Hamlet
• Cognition
• Psychology
• Decision-Making
• Character
• Characters
• Kahneman
• Haidt
• Parvini
• Analyse
• William Shakespeare
• British and Irish Literature

“This is a work of undoubted brilliance, which makes several illuminating points … .” (Elisabetta Tarantino, The Years Work in English Studies, April, 2017)

• University of Surrey, UK

  Neema Parvini

Neema Parvini is Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Surrey, UK. His previous books include Shakespeare's History Plays: Rethinking Historicism and Shakespeare and Contemporary Theory: New Historicism and Cultural Materialism.

Policies and ethics