Lovers and Tamers: Transmediations of Shakespeare's TAMING OF THE SHREW to Visual Culture
Lovers and Tamers: Transmediations of Shakespeare's TAMING OF THE SHREW to Visual Culture
Author(s): Mihaela UrsaSubject(s): Comparative Study of Literature, Sociology of Culture, Film / Cinema / Cinematography, Sociology of Art
Published by: Universitatea Babeş-Bolyai
Keywords: Shakespeare; The Taming of the Shrew; transmediation; visual culture; film posters
Summary/Abstract: The critical dispute in the interpretive history of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew is traditionally polarised between whether Katherina is - at the end of the play - tamed or not. This article examines part of this interpretive history as a barometer of cultural coding of domestic love. Instead of deciding yet again if Katherina is sincere, or just acting obedient, I want to see how different cultural contexts choose their reading of a canonic play in popular culture. The article shows how and where the social codes of these cultural contexts become visible in selecting their interpretive arguments from a virtually endless line of possibilities. The material of this analysis is a double transmediation: of literature to film, and of film to film posters. Among some well known adaptations and remakes of The Taming of the Shrew, I also examine a lesser-known Romanian filmic reference to this intertext.
Journal: Metacritic Journal for Comparative Studies and Theory
- Issue Year: 2/2016
- Issue No: 2
- Page Range: 8-25
- Page Count: 18
- Language: English