Godless Shakespeare

Eric S. Mallin

Bloomsbury Academic, 2007 - Literary Criticism - 132 pages

Godless Shakespeare is the first book to discuss Shakespeare's plays from an atheist perspective. Although it is clear that Shakespeare engaged with and deployed much of his culture's broadly religious interests - his language is shot through with biblical quotations, priestly sermonizing and Christian imagery - Mallin argues that there is a profound absence of or hostility to God in his plays.

Following Dante's three part structure for The Divine Comedy - Hell represents expressions of religious faith in Shakespeare's plays, Purgatory sets out more sceptical positions, and Heaven shows articulations of godlessness - Mallin traces a spiritual ascent from the unthinkingly devout to the atheistically spiritual. This polemical, vigorous account focuses on the moral and spiritual dilemmas of major characters, developing the often subtle transitions between belief, scepticism and atheism. Finally, Godless Shakespeare argues for the liberating potential of unbelief.

Contents

• Introduction: 1
• Gods Bitch Pericles: 13
• The Promise Friar Laurence: 25

About the author

Eric S. Mallin is Associate Professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin, USA. He is the author of Inscribing the Time: Shakespeare and the End of Elizabethan England (Berkeley: U of California P, 1995)

Bibliographic information

• Title: Godless Shakespeare; Godless Shakespeare, Eric Scott Mallin; Shakespeare Now!
• Author: Eric S. Mallin
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic, 2007
• Original from: the University of California
• Digitized: May 15, 2008
• ISBN: 0826490425, 9780826490421
• Length: 132 pages
• Subjects: Literary Criticism / Drama; Literary Criticism / General; Literary Criticism / Shakespeare; Religion / Theology