About the Legacy Lecture

Shakespeare’s plays remain popular world-wide, so resonant in our own world, yet so distant. This talk aims to bridge the gap of almost 500 years from the Age of Shakespeare to our own times. It approaches Shakespeare through multiple journeys: to Elizabethan London, a global, multicultural city with popular playhouses visited by all social classes; to the world of the plays themselves, compelling in their depiction of complex, multi-faceted characters often facing difficult moral choices; and finally to our contemporary societies where the relevance of Shakespearean drama is often being addressed to the goals of social justice and inclusion.

Through these journeys, Professor Singh hopes to highlight the uniqueness of Shakespeare’s works in encompassing a wide range of human experience, and engaging audiences through an ethical and empathetic imagination. 

About the Speaker

Professor Jyotsna G. Singh is Professor Emerita of Early Modern Literature and Culture, Department of English. 

Professor Singh’s research interests include early modern literature and culture, including Shakespeare, travel writing, early modern histories of Islam, and gender and race studies. Her key publications include: The Weyward Sisters: Shakespeare and Feminist Politics, co-authored (Blackwell 1994); Colonial Narratives/Cultural Dialogues: ‘Discovery’ of India in the Language of Colonialism (Routledge 1996); Travel Knowledge: European ‘Discoveries’ in the Early Modern Period (Palgrave 2001) co-authored; A Companion to the Global Renaissance: Literature and Culture in the Era of Expansion, 1500-1700 Second Edition, ed. (Wiley Blackwell 2021). The Postcolonial World, co-ed (Routledge 2017); and Shakespeare and Postcolonial Theory (Arden 2019).

She has received several research fellowships: at the Folger Shakespeare Library (2006-070; Distinguished Visiting Faculty Fellowship at Queen Mary, University of London (2008); Long-Term Fellowship at the John Carter Brown Library, Brown University, (2010); and visiting Fellowship at St. Catherine’s College, Oxford University, UK (Fall 2019). She has also led and designed three Research Workshops at the Newberry Library (Renaissance Center): Angle-Muslim Encounters (2011), Reading the Early Modern Angle-Muslim Archive (2012); and Early Anglo-Muslim Encounters, (2020).

Professor Singh is internationally recognized and has given many keynote/plenary lectures, including: Shakespeare Society of Southern Africa (University of Cape Town, South Africa); Spanish and Portuguese Soc. for English Renaissance Studies, Annual Conference, Lisbon; University of Athens, Greece; University of Helsinki, Finland; University of Kent, UK; Queens University, Belfast, UK; University of Lisbon; Ashoka University, Delhi, among others.