Series | Studi e ricerche
Edited book | The Merchant in Venice: Shakespeare in the Ghetto
Chapter | “Antonio, il mercante della nostra storia”: Adapting The Merchant of Venice for Italian Children
“Antonio, il mercante della nostra storia”: Adapting The Merchant of Venice for Italian Children
Abstract
This essay discusses the challenges of adapting Shakespeare’s play in narrative form for young readers. It cites the history of such adaptation, thinking about the ‘set of instructions’ authors have provided child readers to respond to the problematic elements of the play (usury, religious and personal prejudice, mercenary marriages, homosexual attraction, cuckoldry). It tracks Tosi’s experience of translating/adapting the play and examines the narrative and ideological choices she made in her illustrated version (2015). The power of this story for children, Tosi argues, lies in its potential to ask questions relevant to their lives today.
Published June 10, 2021 | Language: en
Keywords The Merchant of Venice • Venice • Shylock • Portia • Adaptation • Lewis Carroll • Charles and Mary Lamb • Children’s literature • Translation • Narrativization
Copyright © 2021 Laura Tosi. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-503-2/011
