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- Title
WHAT THE HELL IS UNDER THE STAGE? TRAPDOOR USE IN THE ENGLISH SENECAN TRADITION.
- Authors
Power, Andrew J.
- Abstract
This paper looks at the staging conventions of the trapdoor in the Senecan-styled tragedy of the Elizabethan period. It looks at the development of trapdoor use in the tragedies of the Inns of Court plays of the 1560s and 1570s, and at the slightly earlier University translations and productions of Seneca to establish a frame of reference for the representation of Hell, the underworld, and everything else that lurks beneath the trapdoor of the Elizabethan playhouse. Having established a set of classical underworld referents in the use of the trapdoor in the tradition established in the earlier scholarly settings of the Universities and Inns of Court, the paper concludes by looking at the implications of these conventions for the use of the trapdoor in two of Shakespeare's tragedies: Titus Andronicus and Hamlet.
- Subjects
ENGLISH drama (Tragedy) -- History &; criticism; EARLY modern English drama -- History &; criticism; SENECA, Lucius Annaeus, ca. 4 B.C.-65 A.D.; DRAMATIC works of William Shakespeare; TITUS Andronicus (Play : Shakespeare); HAMLET (Legendary character)
- Publication
English: The Journal of the English Association, 2011, Vol 60, Issue 231, p276
- ISSN
0013-8215
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1093/english/efr037