ABSTRACT
In his landmark study Shakespeare at the Globe 1599-1609, Bernard Beckerman examined the mode of localization in fifteen plays of this period. Beckerman himself hinted at an extremely suggestive approach to the problems, which unfortunately he did not proceed to pursue: 'Even when attention is directly called to the stage-as-stage, stage-as-fictional-world still remains'. Shakespeare's use of these different types of space can best be studied in terms of his adaptation of the traditional dramaturgy of locus and platea. The liminal quality is in consonance with a mise-en-scene that, undaunted by high Renaissance principles of proportion, harmony and tectonic order, accommodates meaningful gaps in space and time. Reading of locus and platea types of space in one scene from Timon of Athens and one scene from Macbeth cannot, of course, do justice to the full spectrum of Elizabethan uses of theatrical space, let alone their participation in larger issues and divisions in early modern culture.
