This course will focus on the representations of multiple vulnerabilities in Early Modern drama. Irrespective of generic differences, Early Modern plays can be used to study the structural conditions that make lives precarious, and following from that, the ways in which those who are rendered vulnerable respond and react to their condition.

The forms of vulnerability which will be studied include youth and old age, gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, among others. The core texts are the following and are illustrative of the three major dramatic genres as well:

Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II;

William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream;

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

In addition to studying the vulnerabilities portrayed in the actual play texts, a component of the course will include afterlives, adaptations and how the EM texts are themselves rendered vulnerable. Gender- and colour-blind casting, the transposing of the texts from their time and location to contemporary times and contexts and the changes these wreak on the plays will be studied in terms of vulnerability, resilience and the long afterlives of these play texts. In addition a component of generic vulnerability will be studied wherein we consider the fluid nature of genre classifications during the Early Modern, and how texts which might be titled a history or tragedy can be read to highlight a particular genre.

Students will be expected to read EM plays, print adaptations, and view video and theatre adaptations.