Shakespeare in Singapore: Performance, Education, and Culture

Shakespeare in Singapore provides the first detailed and sustained study of the role of Shakespeare in Singaporean theatre, education, and culture.

This book tracks the role and development of Shakespeare in education from the founding of modern Singapore to the present day, drawing on sources such as government and school records, the entire span of Singapore’s newspaper archives, playbills, interviews with educators and theatre professionals, and existing academic sources. By uniting the critical interest in Singaporean theatre with the substantial body of scholarship that concerns global Shakespeare, the author overs a broad, yet in-depth, exploration of the ways in which Singaporean approaches to Shakespeare have been shaped by, and respond to, cultural work going on elsewhere in Asia.

A vital read for all students and scholars of Shakespeare, Shakespeare in Singapore offers a unique examination of the cultural impact of Shakespeare, beyond its usual footing in the Western world.

Philip Smith is professor of English and associate chair at Savannah College of Art and Design, Hong Kong. He has served as fight choreographer for the Shakespeare in Paradise Festival and was co-founder, co-director, and teacher at the Shakespeare Behind Bars programme at Nassau’s Department of Corrections Facility. He has written on Shakespeare and on Singaporean literature for numerous journals, as well as authoring Reading Art Spiegelman (2015).