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The Unheard Prayer: Religious Toleration in Shakespeare’s Drama , Studies in Religion and the Arts (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012), pp. xxxi + 187, ISBN 978-90-04-23005-7 (hbk). £85.00. Sterrett’s excellent volume refuses the well-worn path that asks about Shakespeare’s religious commitment and instead pursues a much more interesting question about the function of prayer in his plays. To do so, Sterrett applies a refreshingly pragmatic blend of new historicism and formalism; there are also brief but meaningful applications of Jacques Derrida’s description of confession (via Derrida’s interpretation of St. Augustine) and Emmanuel Levinas’ interpretation of the silent other. The book avoids jargon, is direct and original, and makes sparing but skilled use of the secondary literature that might otherwise overwhelm this brief but rich work. A chapter is devoted to each of the following plays: Titus Andronicus , Love’s Labour’s Lost , Richard II , Hamlet , All’s Well that Ends Well and King Lear . Sterrett proposes that while prayer is most certainly aimed at the heavens, it is also overheard by characters within the play and indeed by the audience. Further, when these prayers fail to receive a divine response, they show their true purpose to
International Journal of Public Theology – Brill
Published: Feb 4, 2014
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