Much Ado About Nothing: Shakespeare's Bastards and Illegitimacy in Shakespeare's Time

In today's episode, we are exploring the historical and theatrical context for bastard characters in Shakespeare's plays and other plays of the early modern period. We'll explore the cultural norms that existed for illegitimate children during the Elizabethan and Jacobean and the legal, financial, and social prejudices they and their parents experienced. We will also discuss how the experience of illegitimacy intersects with class in early modern England.

Then, we will explore how the early modern theatre mirrored the experience of illegitimate children and how bastard characters were used as a tool by dramatists for the early modern theatre.

Transcript to come

Shakespeare Anyone? is created and produced by Kourtney Smith and Elyse Sharp.

Music is "Neverending Minute" by Sounds Like Sander.

Follow us on Instagram at @shakespeareanyonepod for updates or visit our website at shakespeareanyone.com

You can support the podcast by becoming a patron at patreon.com/shakespeareanyone, sending us a virtual tip via our tipjar, or by shopping our bookshelves at bookshop.org/shop/shakespeareanyonepod.

Works referenced:

Findlay, Alison. Illegitimate Power: Bastards in Renaissance Drama. United Kingdom, Manchester University Press, 2009.