Shakespeare on Love
Shakespeare on Love

Author: Joseph Pearce

Publisher: Ignatius Press

Published: 2013-03-04

Total Pages: 169

ISBN-13: 1681494337

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Having given the evidence for William Shakespeare's Catholicism in two previous books, literary biographer Joseph Pearce turns his attention in this work to the Bard's most famous play, Romeo and Juliet. "Star-crossed" Romeo and Juliet are Shakespeare's most famous lovers and perhaps the most well-known lovers in literary history. Though the young pair has been held up as a romantic ideal, the play is a tragedy, ending in death. What then, asks Pearce, is Shakespeare saying about his protagonists? Are they the hapless victims of fate, or are they partly to blame for their deaths? Is their love the "real thing", or is it self-indulgent passion? And what about the adults in their lives? Did they give the young people the example and guidance that they needed? The Catholic understanding of sexual desire, and its need to be ruled by reason, is on display in Romeo and Juliet, argues Pearce. The play is not a paean to romance but a cautionary tale about the naïveté and folly of youthful infatuation and the disastrous consequences of poor parenting. The well-known characters and their oft-quoted lines are rich in symbolic meaning that points us in the direction of the age-old wisdom of the Church. Although such a reading of Romeo and Juliet is countercultural in an age that glorifies the heedless and headless heart of young love, Pearce makes his case through a meticulous engagement with Shakespeare and his age and with the text of the play itself.

Shakespeare's Christianity
Shakespeare's Christianity

Author: E. Beatrice Batson

Publisher: Baylor University Press

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 198

ISBN-13: 1932792368

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This volume explores the influences of Catholicism and Protestantism in a trio of Shakespeare's tragedies: Julius Caesar, Macbeth, and Hamlet. Bypassing the discussion of Shakespeare's personal religious beliefs, Batson instead focuses on distinct footprints left by Catholic and Protestant traditions that underlie and inform Shakespeare's artistic genius.

The Quest for Shakespeare
The Quest for Shakespeare

Author: Joseph Pearce

Publisher: Ignatius Press

Published: 2009-09-03

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 1681495341

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Highly regarded and best-selling literary writer and teacher, Joseph Pearce presents a stimulating and vivid biography of the world's most revered writer that is sure to be controversial. Unabashedly provocative, with scholarship, insight and keen observation, Pearce strives to separate historical fact from fiction about the beloved Bard. Shakespeare is not only one of the greatest figures in human history, he is also one of the most controversial and one of the most elusive. He is famous and yet almost unknown. Who was he? What were his beliefs? Can we really understand his plays and his poetry if we don't know the man who wrote them? These are some of the questions that are asked and answered in this gripping and engaging study of the world's greatest ever poet. The Quest for Shakespeare claims that books about the Bard have got him totally wrong. They misread the man and misread the work. The true Shakespeare has eluded the grasp of the critics. Dealing with the facts of Shakespeare's life and times, Pearce's quest leads to the inescapable conclusion that Shakespeare was a believing Catholic living in very anti-Catholic times. Many of his friends and family were persecuted, and even executed, for their Catholic faith. And yet he seems to have avoided any notable persecution himself. How did he do this? How did he respond to the persecution of his friends and family? What did he say about the dreadful and intolerant times in which he found himself? The Quest for Shakespeare answers these questions in ways that will enlighten and astonish those who love Shakespeare's work, and that will shock and outrage many of his critics. This book is full of surprises for beginner and expert alike.

Catholic Theology in Shakespeare's Plays
Catholic Theology in Shakespeare's Plays

Author: David N. Beauregard

Publisher: Associated University Presse

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 227

ISBN-13: 0874130026

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Explores and reexamines Shakespeare's theology from the standpoint of revisionist history of the English Reformation.

Religion Around Shakespeare
Religion Around Shakespeare

Author: Peter Iver Kaufman

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2015-06-26

Total Pages: 341

ISBN-13: 0271069589

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For years scholars and others have been trying to out Shakespeare as an ardent Calvinist, a crypto-Catholic, a Puritan-baiter, a secularist, or a devotee of some hybrid faith. In Religion Around Shakespeare, Peter Kaufman sets aside such speculation in favor of considering the historical and religious context surrounding his work. Employing extensive archival research, he aims to assist literary historians who probe the religious discourses, characters, and events that seem to have found places in Shakespeare’s plays and to aid general readers or playgoers developing an interest in the plays’ and playwright’s religious contexts: Catholic, conformist, and reformist. Kaufman argues that sermons preached around Shakespeare and conflicts that left their marks on literature, law, municipal chronicles, and vestry minutes enlivened the world in which (and with which) he worked and can enrich our understanding of the playwright and his plays.

Shadowplay
Shadowplay

Author: Clare Asquith

Publisher: PublicAffairs

Published: 2018-10-23

Total Pages: 395

ISBN-13: 1541774302

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In 16th century England many loyal subjects to the crown were asked to make a terrible choice: to follow their monarch or their God. The era was one of unprecedented authoritarianism: England, it seemed, had become a police state, fearful of threats from abroad and plotters at home. This age of terror was also the era of the greatest creative genius the world has ever known: William Shakespeare. How, then, could such a remarkable man born into such violently volatile times apparently make no comment about the state of England in his work? He did. But it was hidden. Revealing Shakespeare's sophisticated version of a forgotten code developed by 16th-century dissidents, Clare Asquith shows how he was both a genius for all time and utterly a creature of his own era: a writer who was supported by dissident Catholic aristocrats, who agonized about the fate of England's spiritual and political life and who used the stage to attack and expose a regime which he believed had seized illegal control of the country he loved. Shakespeare's plays offer an acute insight into the politics and personalities of his era. And Clare Asquith's decoding of them offers answers to several mysteries surrounding Shakespeare's own life, including most notably why he stopped writing while still at the height of his powers. An utterly compelling combination of literary detection and political revelation, Shadowplay is the definitive expose of how Shakespeare lived through and understood the agonies of his time, and what he had to say about them.

A Will to Believe
A Will to Believe

Author: David Scott Kastan

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 168

ISBN-13: 0199572895

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A Will to Believe is a revised version of Kastan's 2008 Oxford Wells Shakespeare Lectures, providing a provocative account of the ways in which religion animates Shakespeare's plays.

Shakespeare and the Culture of Christianity in Early Modern England
Shakespeare and the Culture of Christianity in Early Modern England

Author: Dennis Taylor

Publisher: Studies in Religion and Litera

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13:

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The question of Shakespeare's Catholic contexts has occupied many scholars in recent years and this study brings together 16 original essays examining Shakespeare's work in the light of revisionist scholarship, from monastic life in 'Measure for Measure' to Puritanism in 'Hamlet'.

Prayer Primer
Prayer Primer

Author: Thomas Dubay

Publisher: Ignatius Press

Published: 2009-09-03

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 1681493861

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Fr. Thomas Dubay, a renowned teacher and writer on prayer and the spiritual life, presents a simple, profound and practical book on the most important of all human activities, communion with God. Prayer Primer is written for intelligent adults (and teenagers) who want God and a serious prayer life, but it does not presuppose that they need or have a theological background. It does take up many questions rarely answered adequately in the classroom or from the pulpit, often not mentioned at all: Why pray? (be ready for some surprises) ... Why vocal prayer is important and yet should be limited ... What contemplation is and is not ... Praying with Scripture ... Family prayer - even how to introduce children to group meditation ... Prayer in a busy life ... Pitfalls and problems - together with solutions ... Buddhism? New Age? Centering prayer? ... What should you do when dry and empty and not at all inclined to pray? How do you even get started? ... Where and how to begin? ... Assessing progress ... Growing in depth. All of these subjects, and more, are clearly and concisely explained for citizens of this 21st century.

How to Pray the Rosary
How to Pray the Rosary

Author: Donald H. Calloway

Publisher: Marian Press - Association of Marian Helpers

Published: 2017-05-23

Total Pages: 41

ISBN-13: 1596144025

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In this handy little guide, best-selling author Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, teaches you how to pray the Rosary well and why it matters, addressing issues such as: Why pray the Rosary? How long should a well-prayed Rosary take? What are the graces attached to praying the Rosary? How can I become a champion of the Rosary? Our Lady needs Rosary champions to help bring peace in the world. Will you answer her call to prayer?