Shakespeare re-positioned: intertextuality and the demystification of the canon in contemporary drama

Abstract

With the emergence of many theories such as post-colonialism and feminism intertextual rewriting and the subversion of the canon in literature have been widely used in the twentieth century This study analyzes how intertextuality and the demystification process work in contemporary drama -especially in contemporary Shakespeare adaptations since it is impossible to exclude Shakespeare as the father of drama. The primary sources used in this paper are “Harlem Duet” by Djanet Sears, Goodnight Desdemona (Good morning Juliet) by Ann-Marie MacDonald, “A Branch of the Blue Nile” by Derek Walcott, “This Island’s Mine” by Philip Osment and “Dogg’s Hamlet, Cahoot’s Macbeth” by Tom Stoppard. The bulk of this rewriting process and the theory of intertextuality are nourished through the idea of resistance. Therefore, this paper analyzes the idea of “resistance” -whether it defies patriarchy, colonialism, heterosexuality or the hegemony of language. It also discusses how rewriting appears as a form of resistance and how resistance functions in this rewriting process. Moreover, this study looks at how these “defiant” theories avoid becoming essentialist with the help of postmodernist elements. With the use of multiplicity of time, space, resistances, subjectivities and acting, the plays discussed in this study shun the mainstream. This study points out that these plays stand in a third position, which is situated between the canonical and the non-canonical, resistance and admiration, the center and the periphery, Shakespeare and non-Shakespeare.