A Buddhist's Shakespeare: Affirming Self-deconstructions"In this argument, Howe applies his Buddhist perspective to some key ideas of neo-Marxists, Michel Foucault, and new historicists concerning the relations between literature and society. This perspective provides new challenges to the Marxist view that society necessarily determines our consciousness, Foucault's position that everyone in society is necessarily enclosed within a power field of competing and therefore oppositional interests, and the new historicist position that a society's established authority maintains itself in part by legitimating dissent in order to contain it. Howe proposes instead the possibility of a non-oppositional, nonideological posture in which one can stand apart from the class oppositions of Marx, the power field of Foucault, and the containment of dissent alleged by many new historicists, yet in a way which actually reduces the misery caused by social injustice." "Engaging contemporary theoretical debate, Howe draws a parallel between Jacques Derrida's ideas about "differance" - in which "presence" occurs only in "absence" - and the Buddhist idea of shunyata, the fullness of emptiness. He also shows the similarities between Derrida's and Buddhism's critiques of reason and language.". |
From inside the book
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... perspective to some key ideas of neo - Marxists , Michel Foucault , and new historicists concerning the relations between literature and society . This per- spective provides new challenges to the Marxist view that society necessarily ...
... perspective to some key ideas of neo - Marxists , Michel Foucault , and new historicists concerning the relations between literature and society . This per- spective provides new challenges to the Marxist view that society necessarily ...
Page 14
... point when my previous assumptions about myself and the world seemed to be in transition , a friend introduced me to ... point all along , and even after this discovery I resisted the idea of writing a Buddhist's view of Shake- speare ...
... point when my previous assumptions about myself and the world seemed to be in transition , a friend introduced me to ... point all along , and even after this discovery I resisted the idea of writing a Buddhist's view of Shake- speare ...
Page 20
... point of view , we might think of Buddhism as a system of contradictions , a systematized denial of the validity of all systems . It is always subversive of established ways of thought , its own as well as others ' . Much of the ...
... point of view , we might think of Buddhism as a system of contradictions , a systematized denial of the validity of all systems . It is always subversive of established ways of thought , its own as well as others ' . Much of the ...
Page 22
... point of view the list could easily have been lengthened . They were also chosen so that collectively they would seem at least roughly representative of the variety of Shakespeare's work . And they are ordered in such a way as to ...
... point of view the list could easily have been lengthened . They were also chosen so that collectively they would seem at least roughly representative of the variety of Shakespeare's work . And they are ordered in such a way as to ...
Page 24
... vision of differance . From the political point of view , each of these plays not only exposes the " king's games " that authority requires the courtier to play , but puts us in a psychological position in which we might play these ...
... vision of differance . From the political point of view , each of these plays not only exposes the " king's games " that authority requires the courtier to play , but puts us in a psychological position in which we might play these ...
Contents
27 | |
Awakening The Sword of Prajna in the Visual Arts and in Richard III | 51 |
The Merchant of Venice as Sword of Prajna | 74 |
The Cause of Suffering and the Birth of Compassion in Julius Caesar | 96 |
The Emptiness of Differenceand the Six Samsaric Realms in Antony and Cleopatra | 114 |
Prince Hals Deferral as the Ground of Free Play | 146 |
Further Glimpses of Free Play in Hamlet and King Lear | 168 |
The Tempest | 191 |
Common terms and phrases
actor affirmation Antony and Cleopatra Antony's argues art of resemblance artists audience authority awareness Bassanio becomes believe Bottom Brutus Brutus's Buddhist Buddhist view character Chögyam Trungpa choose consciousness context conventional create death deconstruction deferred Derrida desire différance discourse dramatic Duccio Elizabethan emphasizes emptiness enacts example experience fact Falstaff Foucault give Greenblatt Hal's Hamlet Holbein honor Hotspur human idea identity illusion implications interpretation Jonathan Dollimore Julius Caesar king Lear lovers metadramatic Midsummer Night's Dream nature nirvana Noble ourselves painting perspective play play's point of view political Portia Prajna present prince Prospero Pyramus and Thisby realistic reality relationship Renaissance representation Richard role Roman Roy Strong samsara scene seems self-image sense Shakespeare shows Shylock situation stage Stephen Greenblatt Stephen Orgel style subversion sunyata Tennenhouse texts theater theatrical Theseus things tion transparent Trungpa truth University Press vantage point viewer visual arts
Popular passages
Page 29 - I have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream, — past the wit of man to say what dream it was : man is but an ass, if he go about to expound this dream.