ABSTRACT
To celebrate the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare's death, Hogarth Press commissioned a series of novels based on individual Shakespeare plays by popular contemporary writers. If Geoffrey Wright’s novel exposes the dangers of identification with a Shakespearean character, it also functions as a kind of anti-Bildungsroman. In Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, Professor Bhaer gives Jo a copy of Shakespeare, with this instruction: "Read him well, and he will help you much; for the study of character in this book will help you to read it in the world, and paint it with your pen". Wright's attraction to but ultimate rejection of Shakespearean tragedy raises questions about the continuing relevance of that genre. The sudden proliferation of Shakespeare novels by women at the end of the twentieth century shows a remarkable coherence around the figures of King Lear and Prospero. Some novel protagonists the struggle with an overbearing Shakespearean prototype is far more damaging and restrictive.
