Alla soglia dei quattrocento anni dalla morte di Shakespeare e dei cinquecento dalla nascita del Ghetto veneziano (anniversari che ricorreranno nel 2016), il Centro Studi sul Teatro della Fondazione Giorgio Cini e l'Università Ca' Foscari di Venezia organizzano The Shylock Project. L'iniziativa (15 giugno-10 luglio 2015) consiste in una summer school di studi per ricercatori e appassionati (Shakespeare in Venice) dedicata all'approfondimento testuale e contestuale dell'ebreo protagonista de Il mercante di Venezia; nonché in un ciclo di conferenze e spettacoli a tema in lingua inglese dislocati in vari punti della città.

Il progetto Shylock consentirà a un pubblico più ampio (in aggiunta a quello seminariale della summer school) di assistere alle conferenze di una quarantina di studiosi provenienti da tutto il mondo (tra i quali Stanley Wells, Stephen Greenblatt e James Shapiro), a una conversazione di Alan Yentob della BBC con il romanziere inglese Howard Jacobson, che sta riscrivendo Shakespeare in chiave moderna, a un concerto di musica elisabettiana, a una rivisitazione del tormentato tentativo di Orson Welles di portare in scena e sullo schermo The Merchant of Venice.

In programma anche una anteprima dello spettacolo Il mercante di Venezia con la Compagnia de' Colombari, la cui rappresentazione ufficiale è prevista l'anno prossimo in un luogo d'eccezione: il Campo del Ghetto di Venezia.

Di seguito il programma completo:

WEEK 1: JUNE 15-21

15 June

18.00 

Opening Ceremony 

Welcome Dinner

16 June

9.30 

Donatella Calabi, Which is the way to master Jew's?: Introducing the Ghetto of Venice

11,30

Keir Elam, Fair Portia's counterfeit: Visual culture in Shakespeare's Venice

16,00

Guided tour to the Ghetto of Venice, Synagogues and “Banco Rosso” Pawnshop

17 June

9,30 

Avraham Oz, Disinheriting a Father: Shylock as Alien on the Hebrew Stage

11,30

Michael Shapiro, A local habitation and a name: Imagining Shylock's House

17,30

Karin Coonrod, Shakespeare in Italy, Shylock in the Ghetto: Past and Future Projects 

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public lecture

18 June

9,30 

Natália Pikli, Love (dis)credited: “The Merchant of Venice” and usury in early modern England

11,30

B. J. Sokol, The trials of Shylock 

15,00 

Guided tour to Fondazione Giorgio Cini

17,30

Carol Chillington Rutter

Sir Henry Wotton: Venice in the Age of Shakespeare 

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public lecture

19 June

9,30 

Tom Cartelli, Repurposing Fiorentino's Doting Godfather as “Tainted Wether of the Flock” in “The Merchant of Venice”

11,30

Shaul Bassi, Shylock and the Native Informant

14,30

David Whittaker, Thomas Coryat's Venice: Walking the City in 1608

WEEK 2: JUNE 22-28

22 June

15,30 

Loretta Innocenti, George Granville's “The Jew of Venice”

(Ca' Foscari, Palazzo Cosulich)

17,30

Stephen Orgel, Which Is the Merchant Here, and Which the Jew?: Shylock Inside Out

(Ca' Foscari, Aula Baratto)

Public lecture

23 June

9,30 

Géza Kallay, “The Merchant of Venice”: a Philosophical Perspective

11,30

M. Lindsay Kaplan, Canon Law on Jews and “The Merchant of Venice”

24 June

9,30

David Bryant, Valerio de Scarpis, Gabriele Mancuso

Round table: Renaissance Music in England, Venice and the Ghetto 

15,00 

Guided tour of Doge's Palace, with Monica Chojnacka

25 June

16,00 

Stephen J. Greenblatt, The Secret Weight of “The Merchant of Venice”

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lecture

18,00

Howard Jacobson in conversation with Alan Yentob (BBC) on Rewriting Shylock

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lecture

21,00 

Performance: Matt Chiorini, Orson Welles/Shylock, Docu-Fantasy Radio Play

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Event

26 June

9,30 

Gilberto Sacerdoti, Jessica's Cosmopolitan Dreams. Noachic Laws vs Blood Transfusion

11,30

Ramie Targoff, Italian Women's Writing in the Age of Shakespeare

16,00

Stephen Greenblatt, Jay Harris, Werner Sollors

(Ca' Foscari - Harvard Symposium)

Eden in Venice: Reading Adam and Eve

(Ca' Foscari, Ca' Dolfin)

* Optional activity

21,00

Performance

Karin Coonrod & Colombari Company

“The Merchant of Venice”: First Theatrical Actions

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Event

WEEK 3: JUNE 29 – JULY 5

29 June

15,00 

Freddie Rokem, “But the full sum of me is the sum of something”. Counting to Three in “The Merchant of Venice”

17,30

Bill Alexander, A Merchant of Many Faces

(Palazzo Mocenigo)

Public Lecture

Concert

Rosemary Forbes-Butler & Pier Paolo Ciurlia

Why is Fancy Bred?

(Palazzo Mocenigo)

Public Event

30 June

9,30 

László Benke, Stereotypes of Jews in early Italian Vernacular Literature and Bible translations

11,30

Galit Hasan-Rokem, “The Hebrew will turn Christian”: Shylock and the medieval Wandering Jew traditions in Italy and England

14,30

Sandra Pietrini and Valeria Tirabasso, Introducing "Arianna": a Shakespearean Iconographic Archive

1 July

9,00 

Daytrip to "Belmont" 

(Villa Emo & Villa Maser)

2 July

11,00 

Alessandro Serpieri, Shakespeare's Bonds

14,30

Tibor Fabiny, Mercy and Justice in “The Merchant” and Milton 

16,00

Kent Cartwright, “The Merchant of Venice” and the Traditions of Comedy

21,00

“Venice a night walk” an itinerary with Alberto Toso Fei

3 July

10,00

Paola Bertolone, Moni Ovadia's Shylock 

11,30

Loredana Polezzi, Translating, Adapting, Rewriting Shylock

16,00

Péter Dávidházi, Hamlet, Shylock and the Meaning of Biblical Allusions

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lecture

17,30

James Shapiro, Shakespeare and the Jews

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lecture

WEEK 4: JULY 6-10

6 July

9,30 

Murray Baumgarten, Israel Zangwill, Philip Roth, and the Afterlife of the Venice Ghetto

11,30

Simon Levis Sullam, Shylock is (not) Dead: Italian Jews under Fascism

16,00 

Guided tour to the Jewish Cemetery

7 July

9,30 

Roberta Cimarosti, The Use of Postcolonial Shylocks

11,30

Laura Tosi, “The Merchant” for children: Prose Adaptations from the Lambs to Marcia Williams

16,00

Tobias Döring, Shylock, the German

(Viu, San Servolo)

Public Lecture

17,30

David Schalkwyk, Shylock and the Impossible Gift of Love  

(Viu, San Servolo)

Public Lecture

8 July

9,30

Saba Burali, Introducing the Cini Iconographic Archive: an overview of the Shakespearean material

11,30

Maria Ida Biggi, Max Reinhardt's “Merchant” in Venice

14,30

Suzanne Wofford, Shakespeare and Italian Novelle

9 July

9,30 

Fernando Cioni, Shylock's Afterlife

11,30

Boika Sokolova, The Bulgarian Afterlife of the “The Merchant of Venice” 

14,30

Ronan Hatfull, Richard Croughan, Bryony Rutter, The Testament of Launcelot Gobbo: a Shakespeare Re-imagining, read-through of a work in progress

10 July

10-12 

Final Discussion

16,00

Paul Edmondson, Christianity and “The Merchant”

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lucture

18,00

Stanley Wells, Shylocks

(Fondazione Giorgio Cini)

Public Lucture 

Farewell Dinner