Wątki szekspirowskie w serialu "Doctor Who"

• Authors: Gierszewsla Marta

Title variants

EN

Shakespearean Motifs in the Doctor Who Television Programme

Abstracts

EN

The article aims at analysing how stereotypical opinions about William Shakespeare and his work function in the famous BBC television programme Doctor Who, which shows the adventures of a humanoid alien of the Time Lords race who is known as the Doctor and is travelling though time and space. Except for the action focused on rescuing individual people or whole civilisations, the programme explores some cliché opinions relating to particular periods of the past and the future. Among the episodes containing historical and literary references there is also ‘The Shakespeare Code’ from 2007, which can be seen as homage to the Stratford master. It shows both the continuing interest in the subject among the contemporary audience as well as persistence of some popular opinions about the author and his plays. The article describes the references to Shakespeare’s life and work appearing in the episode, with special emphasis on direct quotes from his works. They are compared to the facts known about his biography and origins of his plays. Interdisciplinary approach applied here serves to provide a reconstruction of how Shakespeare is perceived in popular opinion and to show the mechanisms and clichés that the authors of the series use. The article also distinguishes between stereotypical opinions of linguistic, situational, and visual kinds. The conclusions reached in the article shed some light on the reception of Shakespeare’s work in popular culture.

Keywords

EN

Shakespeare; TV adaptation; Dr Who

• Publisher: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Sztuki PAN
• Journal: Pamiętnik Teatralny
• Year: 2014
• Volume: 63
• Issue: 3(251)
• Pages: 214-225

Contributors

author

Gierszewsla Marta

• Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu

References

• D. Larnier, Shakespeare and Modern Popular Culture, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2006.
• P. Prescott, Shakespeare and Popular Culture, [w:] The New Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare, ed. M. de Grazia, St. Wells, Cambridge 2010.