The celebrated amphibolic letter in Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II which, left “unpointed”, both saves and kills the King is the last of a long list of pieces of writing in the play. This paper will bring into focus the manner in which the final coup de théâtre is prepared by earlier acts of writing, notably by repeated efforts by charact…[Read more]

Shakespeare’s Rome is nothing but excess—excess as écart, death or even rapture. Caesar exceeds, or crosses, multiple boundaries: after having entered Rome with his army and taken hold of the city, he becomes a living god; after his death, he returns to predict the death of Brutus as a ghost, flouting the laws of Nature. To this, we must add the…[Read more]

Contrary to other plays in which references to poison clearly refer to mortal potions and assassination plots, Coriolanus offers no such thing. Poison is only taken in a figura- tive sense – and yet, the poison in the play is poisonous, infecting not the body natural, but the body politic, underlining the deep-rooted link between poison and e…[Read more]