“Was the monarch a muse? Queen Elizabeth’s influence on William Shakespeare.” Shakespeare, as an actor, playwright, and sharer, performed in the public theatres, but he also - with his company the Lord Chamberlain’s Men - presented his plays before the fierce and theatrical Tudor Protestant, Queen Elizabeth. This presentation will argue that she should be considered as much more significant than simply an audience member for his work. More precisely, she may have influenced his imagination in such profound and surprising ways that she should be classed as a dynamic and electrifying muse. This colloquium will open up questions rather than fully answering them.
Originally from Dublin, Patrick O’Donnell has happily called Minnesota home for more than twenty years. He is a literary historian in Normandale’s English Department with research interests in the Tudor Renaissance and Shakespeare; Modernism and James Joyce; and, in particular, the weird and strange and highly speculative problem of influence in literary creativity.
