Shakespeare's Don Quixote: A Novel in Dialogue

ISBN-13: 9780950671512 / Angielski / Miękka / 2011 / 227 str.

Robin Chapman

Opis

SHAKESPEARES DON QUIXOTE recreates what might have been: a lost play presented at Whitehall Palace in 1613. That year Shakespeares company provided 14 plays for a royal wedding. One was called Cardenio. The original script has never been found but an 18th century version, retitled Double Falsehood, may contain echoes of their work together. Cardenios story occurs in Don Quixote, Cervantess universal best-seller, wherein the vexed teenager protagonist encounters the would-be knight errant and his sceptical squire. If Shakespeares attention was drawn to the storys dramatic potential it seems likely it would have featured Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, since by that time Cervantess double act was appearing on stage and in carnivals worldwide. Acting upon this hypothesis Robin Chapmans novel plays out today in a theatre of the mind. Among the audience the reader will find the attentive spirits of Shakespeare, Fletcher and Cervantes who soon become involved with each other and in the performance.