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Shakespeare and Fun: The Birth of Entertainment Value

Shakespeare and Fun: The Birth of Entertainment Value

by Hedrick, Donald
No customer reviews yet ISBN 9781350002845 The Arden Shakespeare

In this bold, original study Hedrick proposes an early modern 'entertainment value' revolution, to which Shakespeare contributed and in which he played a competitive role.

As London's nascent capitalist industry developed and the variety of entertainments proliferated, theatre contributes to the birth of entertainment value and a commercial trajectory toward what Marxist critic Adorno theorizes as 'fun, ' seen contemporaneously in LasVegasization and the election of Donald Trump to U.S. Presidency.

In this innovative approach to Shakespeare's plays through their compulsory, competitive relation to other choices from London's entertainment industry, such as sex work and gaming, Hedrick recovers a coherent internal dynamic of theatre's 'pleasure enclosure' accompanying the revolutionary logic of capital's new cultural and economic extremes.

Applying these relations to original, insightful readings of A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Winter's Tale, and The Taming of the Shrew, Hedrick draws from cultural studies, contemporary and personal parallels, wide-ranging historical materials, and political theory. These include: the semantic shifts in keywords of pleasure, the practice of betting on actors, the psychology of paying admission beforean entertainment, and various 'reality shows' such as contests of prose and verse. Continual insights emerge, both broad and specific: from ten 'entertainment value axioms' to Shakespeare's awareness of entertainment value's birth at moments in his late plays, marking a logic of value crisis, bubbles, and the danger of 'too much fun.'

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Product details

BrandThe Arden Shakespeare
Pub dateMar 27, 2025
ISBN-101350002844
ISBN-139781350002845
Hardcover332.0 pages
LanguageEnglish
Dimensions8.5 × 0.75 × 5.5 in
Weight1 lb
Last updated 2025-07-10 11:37
$115.80
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