The Undiscover’d Country: New Essays on Psychoanalysis and Shakespeare

Lyn Stephens contributes the chapter:  

‘A Wilderness of Monkeys: A Psychoanalytic Study of The Merchant of Venice’

This collection of essays, drawing together material from four countries, challenges many of the current trends in Shakespeare studies.

The discussions of Shakespeare’s plays and poems in this collection, by a range of academics, practising psychotherapists and the theatre director Jonathan Miller, discover many kinds of reference beyond the text: intuitable meanings, symbolisms inspired by the dark – undiscover’d – side of human relations, and characterizations of individual and group identities. The authors – Philip K. Bock, M. D. Faber, Jonathan Miller, Ruth Nevo, Angela Sheppard, B. J. Sokol and Lyn Stephens – are especially interested in the dynamics of emotional life. They variously bring to bear on Shakespeare’s texts knowledge of theatrical practice, social history, anthropology, theology, political history, art history and other disciplines.

Edited By B. J. Sokol

London: Free Association Press, 1993