Re-playing Shakespeare in Asia [Paperback]

This book reviews the playing of Shakespeare in which there is a re-staging and a re-writing -- through adaptation, appropriation, or acculturation -- of the Western Shakespeare into the gestural, symbolic, stylized, or ritualized worlds of Asian theatre languages. It examines this interface in aesthetic, theatrical, cultural and political terms, looking at key issues in intercultural performance, how it re-configures the text, genre and gender and how it can intervene in the shaping of ethnicity, identity and postcoloniality. Contributors examine how differing cultures negotiate such encounters, and the implications of this worldwide re-playing for Shakespeares theatre. Focusing specifically on the work of major directors in the central and emerging areas of Asia -- Japan, China, India, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines -- the chapters show how performing Shakespeare in Asia not only revitalizes indigenous theatre forms, but generates an alternate cultural capital which is exploited in the global market.

List of Figures Acknowledgments Re-playing Shakespeare in Asia: An Introduction, Poonam Trivedi Part I: Re-playing Interculturality 1. Other Shakespeares in Asias: An Overview, James Brandon 2. Asian Theatres, Mnouchkine and Shakespeare: The Search for a Theatrical Form, Brian Singleton 3. Shakespeare and the Indian Image(nary) : Embod(y)ment in Versions of A Midsummer Nights Dream, Poonam Trivedi 4. What, has this thing appeard again tonight? : Re-playing Shakespeares on the Japanese Stage, Minami Ryuta Part II: Re-playing Textuality / Theatricality 5. Fooling with Lear: A Performance History of Suzuki Tadashi`s King Lear (1984-2006), Ian Curruthers 6. Six People in Search of To be or not to be & : Hamlets Soliloquy in Six Chinese Productions and the Metamorphosis of Shakespeare Performance on the Chinese Stage, Ruru Li 7. Is This Shakespeare?: Inouel£0