Shakespeare e os clássicos: metamorfoses e reescritas

Abstract

This essay starts off from the idea that all creative writing is rewriting and appropriation of previous texts. It then focuses on Shakespeare’s use of Apuleius’ Golden Ass, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and of the encounter between Ulysses and Nausicaa in Odyssey, transformed into the encounter between Ferdinand and Miranda in The Tempest. Rewriting of old stories in a new configuration is seen as productive translation between cultures. Neil Gaiman’s graphic novel The Sandman is given as an example of the kind of rewriting that makes both Shakespeare and the Greek classical texts our contemporary, relevant for our lives - and for our reading of ancient stories.