Seminar No. 2.2.

Title: Moving around the Mediterranean in the Plays of Shakespeare and his Contemporaries.

Leaders:

Anthony Parr (University of the Western Cape, South Africa)
Chong Zhang (Nanjing University, China)

Participants:

Joan Fitzpatrick (University College Northampton)
Jeanie Grant Moore (University of Wisconsin Oshkosh)
Joan Larsen Klein (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign)
Genevieve Love (Cornell University)
Jim Lusardi (Lafayette College)
Richard Nochimson (Yeshiva University, New York)
Kevin Pask (Concordia University)
June Schlueter (Lafayette College)
Anne M. Tanaka (University of Illinois Urbana- Champaign)
Marilyn Williamson (Wayne State University)
Eric Wilson (Washington and Lee University, Lexington)

Abstract:

The seminar will examine the representation in English Renaissance drama of travel, exotic spaces and cultural encounter
in the Mediterranean world. Participants are invited to address topics such as: the staging of travels and voyages, the
setting of plays in Mediterranean locations, the portrayal of contemporary geo-political struggles in the region, the ways in
which distinct areas are represented in drama, and so on. We also welcome papers that reflect on the implications of
'travel' material for narrative and dramatic form; on the audiences for such plays; and on the role played by public stages
in shaping English attitudes to the foreign. An instructive comparison would be with drama from other regions which
brings a different perspective to bear on the Mediterranean world.