ABSTRACT
In 1970, the Swiss dramatist Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921-90) undertook a dramatic adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus which has hitherto suffered from critical neglect and still awaits its first translation into English.1 The same applies to his earlier adaptation of Shakespeare’s King John.2 Despite the world-wide fame Dürrenmatt acquired in the course of his career, Dürrenmatt’s dramatic practice, both in general and, more specifically, in his response to Shakespeare, is emphatically ‘local’ as defined in the introduction to the present volume (pp. 3-11). Yet just what local position his adaptation of Titus Andronicus occupies is perhaps less easy to determine.
