Anne-Valérie Dulac: Frances Yates's Alhazen

Kingston Shakespeare Podcasts

Anne-Valérie Dulac examines Frances Yates’ reading of Alhazen’s (Ab? ?Al? al-?asan ibn al-?asan ibn al-Haytham; c. 965 – c. 1040) optics as a possible source for the theory of sight in Love’s Labour’s Lost. Dulac prodes deeper into this bold suggestion and provides a reading of the play’s optics (also linking them to the Sonnets) as mirroring Alhazen – a combination of intromission and extramission, the eye receiving and emitting beams of light. Anne-Valérie Dulac is a senior lecturer in early modern literature at Université Paris 13 - Sorbonne Paris Cité. She is currently working on the forthcoming publication of her doctoral dissertation on Philip Sidney and visual culture, completed under the supervision of Professor François Laroque. Her research interests include Sir Philip Sidney’s works and correspondence, visual culture, limning and optics. The paper she will be presenting for this conference is adapted from a forthcoming chapter (“Shakespeare and Alhazen”) in a book edited by Sophie Chiari and Mickaël Popelard entitled Shakespeare and Science. The conference Frances Yates: The Art of Memory was held on April 30, 2016 at the Rose Theatre, Kingston. The session was chaired by Patricia Gillies. Recorded by Anna Rajala and Timo Uotinen. More at: https://kingstonshakespeareseminar.wordpress.com/