Pleasing Everyone
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Author Description
Shakespeare's Plays Were Immensely Popular In Their Own Day -- So Why Do We Refuse To Think Of Them As Mass Entertainment? In Pleasing Everyone, Author Jeffrey Knapp Opens Our Eyes To The Uncanny Resemblance Between Renaissance Drama And The Incontrovertibly Mass Medium Of Golden-age Hollywood Cinema. Through Fascinating Explorations Of Such Famous Plays As Hamlet, The Roaring Girl, And The Alchemist, And Such Celebrated Films As Citizen Kane, The Jazz Singer, And City Lights, Knapp Challenges Some Of Our Most Basic Assumptions About The Relationship Between Art And Mass Audiences. Above All, Knapp Encourages Us To Resist The Prejudice That Mass Entertainment Necessarily Simplifies And Cheapens Whatever It Touches. As Knapp Shows, It Was Instead The Ceaseless Pressure To Please Everyone That Helped Generate The Astonishing Richness And Complexity Of Renaissance Drama As Well As Of Hollywood Film.
Menrva's Summary
THE THESIS
Does the pressure to appeal to a mass audience necessarily degrade the quality of artistic production? Jeffrey Knapp, a scholar of early modern literature, argues that the requirement to please broad audiences served as a catalyst for the complexity found in both Renaissance drama and Golden-age Hollywood cinema. By examining the structural parallels between these two eras, Knapp challenges the academic prejudice that equates mass popularity with artistic simplification.
THE SCOPE MAP
What You Will Find
- Comparative analysis of Renaissance plays including Hamlet, The Roaring Girl, and The Alchemist.
- Critical examination of Hollywood films such as Citizen Kane, The Jazz Singer, and City Lights.
- A theoretical framework linking early modern theatrical practices with 20th-century cinematic techniques.
Scope Limits
- The analysis does not cover non-Western theatrical or cinematic traditions.
- The study focuses primarily on the intersection of popularity and complexity rather than a comprehensive history of either medium.
THE AUTHORITY PERSPECTIVE
Scholars and critics frequently cite this work for its ability to bridge the gap between early modern literature and modern film studies. Readers often note the academic rigor of the prose while appreciating the author's clear challenge to traditional hierarchies of high and low art.
Page Count:
336
Publication Date:
2016-01-01
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
ISBN-10:
0190634073
ISBN-13:
9780190634070
Cultural History
Film Studies
Literary Criticism
Shakespearean Studies
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