'What's aught but as 'tis valued?': Shakespeare's Value

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This talk considers a number of different ways to value Shakespeare: personal, educational, economic, aesthetic – by focusing on the life stories of the first collected edition of his plays, the First Folio of 1623. This book was sold for 15 shillings on publication; copies now fetch millions of pounds. A book that often shows marks of casual use – wine-ring stains, doodling, even pet paw prints – is now treated as a relic.

The cultural geographer Tim Cresswell argues that ‘value is produced by the passage of things in and out of different regimes of value… objects have biographies that are formed as they pass through these regimes of value’. Tracing the biography of the book via its different regimes of value gives a new way to understand questions of Shakespeare, worth, and value.

The seminar will take place at Saïd Business School on 17 February 2016. Please arrive at the School from 12:15pm for a prompt 12.30pm start. Lunch will be provided and then the lecture will commence at 1pm.

Please register here.

 

Saïd Business School Engaging with the Humanities

Contact email: corporate.events@sbs.ox.ac.uk
Audience: Open to all