Shakespeare’s Speculative Art

This is the first book-length analysis of Shakespeare s depiction of specula (mirrors) to reveal the literal and allegorical functions of mirrors in the playwright s art and thought. Adding a new dimension to the plays Troilus and Cressida, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Hamlet, King Henry the Fifth, Love s Labor s Lost, A Midsummer Night s Dream, and All s Well That Ends Well, Maurice A. Hunt also references mirrors in a wide range of external sources, from the Bible to demonic practices. Looking at the concept of speculation through its multiple meanings - cognitive, philosophical, hypothetical, and provisional - this original reading suggests Shakespeare as a craftsman so prescient and careful in his art that he was able to criticize the queen and a former patron with such impunity that he could still live as a gentleman. Front Matter....Pages i-vii Introduction....Pages 1-8 Speculative Understanding and Ignorance in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida, Julius Caesar, and Macbeth....Pages 9-48 Holding Up Drama as an “Ideal” Mirror in Hamlet and The Life of King Henry the Fifth....Pages 49-97 Mirroring Queen Elizabeth in John Lyly’s Comedies....Pages 99-125 Mirroring Queen Elizabeth in Love’s Labor’s Lost....Pages 127-150 A Speculative Political Allegory in A Midsummer Night’s Dream....Pages 151-179 Mirroring the Earl of Southampton in All’s Well That Ends Well....Pages 181-204 Conclusion....Pages 205-210 Back Matter....Pages 211-263 This is the first book-length study of Shakespeare's pastoral comedy to explain how the play represents issues and motifs of interest to literate Elizabethan playgoers in these years, as well as speculatively to Shakespeare himself