In this collaborative work, photographer Rosamond Purcell and Shakespeare scholar Michael Witmore explore the transcendent emotion in Shakespeare's work through photographs, pairing the allusive power of images with the subversive effects of Shakespeare's language. The book takes advantage of oblique connections to reveal things that cannot be represented directly on stage.
Purcell has pioneered the technique of capturing reflections in antique mercury glass apothecary jars, resulting in haunting images that seem to move with the liquid quickness of ideas. These images are an attempt to capture Shakespeare's expansive imagination in action—what Coleridge called his "myriad-mindedness": they take a visceral journey into the world of his plays. Witmore has paired each photograph with a short passage from Shakespeare's plays with an uncanny sense of the playwright's intent.
- ISBN10 0393339483
- ISBN13 9780393339482
- Publish Date 24 September 2010
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country US
- Imprint WW Norton & Co
- Format Paperback
- Pages 128
- Language English