Food in Shakespeare: Early Modern Dietaries and the PlaysA study of common and exotic food in Shakespeare's plays, this is the first book to explore early modern English dietary literature to understand better the significance of food in Shakespearean drama. Food in Shakespeare provides for modern readers and audiences an historically accurate account of the range of, and conflicts between, contemporary ideas that informed the representations of food in the plays. It also focuses on the social and moral implications of familiar and strange foodstuff in Shakespeare's works. This new approach provides substantial fresh readings of Hamlet, Macbeth, As you Like It, The Winter's Tale, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, Henry V, Titus Andronicus, Coriolanus, Pericles, Timon of Athens, and the co-authored Sir Thomas More. Among the dietaries explored are Andrew Boorde's A Compendyous Regyment or a Dyetary of Healthe (1547), William Bullein's The Gouernement of Healthe (1595), Thomas Elyot's The Castle of Helthe (1595) and Thomas Cogan's The Hauen of Health (1636). These dieteries were republished several times in the early modern period; together they typify the genre's condemnation of surfeit and the tendency to blame human disease on feeding practices. This study directs scholarly attention to the importance of early modern dietaries, analyzing their role in wider culture as well as their intersection with dramatic art. In the dietaries food and drink are indices of one's position in relation to complex ideas about rank, nationality, and spiritual well-being; careful consumption might correct moral as well as physical shortcomings. The dietaries are an eclectic genre: some contain recipes for the reader to try, others give tips on more general lifestyle choices, but all offer advice on how to maintain good health via diet. Although some are more stern and humourless than others, the overwhelming impression is that of food as an ally in the battle against disease and ill-health as well as a potential enemy. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 28
... Cannibalism, and the Stereotypes of Ireland Coriolanus Pericles 5 Beyond the Pale: Profane Consumption Hamlet Timon of A thens Titus Andronicus 11 23 29 37 37 57 57 58 63 67 68 72 76 83 89 93 99 105 105 113 119 Conclusion Notes Works ...
... cannibalistic Scythians and the dietary writer Thomas Cogan that the Scots practiced cannibalism. The witches in Macbeth represent a curious fusion of the familiar and the exotic: the cauldron, though synonymous with witchcraft for a ...
... cannibalistic imagery is used in the context of violence provoked by hunger or the fear of hunger. This collaborative ... cannibalism, with mothers ready to eat their children and couples each other. Unlike Coriolanus, whose contempt for ...
... cannibalistic aspects of interment (“a king may progress through the guts of a beggar”) and the ordinary process of ... cannibalism, but, crucially, she eats with ignorant innocence. Titus is keen to distance the Andronici from Gothic ...
... cannibalism of Tamora and, along the way, varying degrees of that which was considered familiar or strange. The early modern preoccupation with moderation is familiar to us, and although their anxieties were formed within a specifically ...
Contents
11 | |
Celtic Acquaintance and Alterity | 37 |
Vegetarianism and the Melancholic | 57 |
Famine and Abstinence Class War and Foreign Foodstuff | 81 |
Profane Consumption | 105 |
Conclusion | 127 |
Index | 155 |