Shakespeare Refracted : Five Plays by Caridad Svich (Methuen Drama Play Collections)

Discover Caridad Svich’s fresh reimaginings of Shakespeare’s plays that highlight the reality of the Latinx experience. Recipient of an OBIE Award for Lifetime Achievement in theatre, Caridad Svich has written over fifty plays and has worked prodigiously as a translator, editor, essayist, and advocate for Latinx theatre: nowhere is this more evident than in her reimaginings of Shakespeare’s plays. This anthology brings together these six plays together in a single volume for the first time, allowing them to be considered and studied like never before. From Twelve Ophelias, which places the characters from Hamlet in Appalachia, to Perdita Gracia which draws upon The Winter’s Tale to tell a story in the Florida Keys, to The Breath of Stars which is realises The Tempest reconfigured for the digital age; Svich’s work reflects contemporary American through the lens of Shakespeare. In doing so, Svich opens up fresh ways of thinking about Shakespeare in relation to present socio-political concerns, thereby speaking directly to the thriving debate surrounding in the intersection of Latinx Studies and Shakespeare, and Shakespeare and race. Featuring an introduction that situates Svich’s Shakespeare reimaginings at the intersection of conversations in Shakespeare Studies, Latinx Studies, and Performance, Translation, and Adaptation/Appropriation Studies, Shakespeare Refracted offers a much-needed access point to both this intersection and Svich’s work.