The Phenomenal Imagining Body in Shakespeare

Michael Schoenfeldt observes that “[o]ne of the most fascinating aspects of early modern thought is its frequent recourse to corporeal narratives to explain phenomena that we would treat as intellectual, emotional, cognitive, or spiritual.” Such illustrations of early modern preoccupation with faculty psychology—particularly the physiological power of the imagination—extend across a range of early modern disciplines, including poetry and play scripts such as Shakespeare’s. Steeped in the Aristotelian ideas that were still considered viable, Shakespeare was also alive to the shifting ideas of his time, evidence of which is embodied in his work. To tap into the ebb and flow of his richly visceral language is to feel the pulse of communication with his contemporary audiences and to begin to grasp the strangeness and sameness of its impact on our own body-minds. And in the gap between what we feel and what we may learn from careful, historicist research lies the imaginative leap that can help deepen our understanding of the early modern imagination’s function within the body. In this chapter, Sachon explores that gap, by putting examples of Shakespeare’s King Lear and Othello under scrutiny of a phenomenological lens. As part of her exploration of the ‘feeling’ imagination, Sachon’s detailed close readings focus primarily on touch as encapsulated in language and generated through the imagination as anticipated sensation. Her discussion centres on examples that are invested in intense, physical experiences or anticipations of violence since these offer fruitful opportunities to engage with and reflect on the impact of Shakespeare’s visceral writing on the embodied mind. Through the intentional gaze of the phenomenological lens, Sachon offers a perspective that moves beyond language as signification or representation, to a consideration of its function and impact in terms of presence and experience, as she considers ways in which Shakespeare’s language triggers and prompts his audiences’ imaginative engagement through embodied sensory appeals.