Lynne Kositsky

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Lynne Kositsky (born 1947) is a Canadian author of poetry and young adult historical fiction. Kositsky, who was born in Montreal, Quebec and grew up in London, England, now lives in the Niagara region of Ontario. [1] As of 2010 she has published ten novels, set in such varied historical contexts as Ireland during the Great Famine of the 1840s, Nova Scotia during the early 19th century, Elizabethan London, and the Holocaust.

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Her books often have in common the theme of a youthful protagonist (usually, but not always, female) surviving social disruption or ostracism in a world dominated by the mistakes of adults. Her four books in the Our Canadian Girl series issued by Penguin all focus on an African Canadian ex-slave, Rachel, who is forced to relocate with her parents to Nova Scotia after the Revolutionary War. Like many of Kositsky's other books, the Rachel series received critical acclaim. The first and fourth books of the Rachel series, in the series were both nominated for the prestigious Hackmatack Award, and A Mighty Big Imagining won a White Raven Award, given by the International Youth Library in Munich to books which "contribute to an international understanding of a culture and people."

The Thought of High Windows garnered extensive critical acclaim and won the Canadian Jewish Book Award for Youth in 2006. Reviewers for Kirkus, [2] The Washington Post, [3] Hornbook Magazine, [4] The Center for Children's Books, [5] and the School Library Journal [6] all voiced critical praise for it.

Kositsky's A Question of Will (2000) deals with the Shakespearean authorship question, exploring the Oxfordian perspective, and she has since co-authored with Roger Stritmatter a series of articles for academic journals on the date, sources, and symbolism of Shakespeare's Tempest . A Question of Will was included in the Folger Shakespeare Library's "Golden Lads and Lasses" exhibit (2006). [7]

Books

Selected works

Related Research Articles

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<i>Prosperos Books</i> 1991 British film by Peter Greenaway

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<i>The Italian</i> (Radcliffe novel) Novel by Ann Radcliffe

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sonnet 38</span> Poem by William Shakespeare

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sonnet 48</span> Poem by William Shakespeare

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sonnet 63</span> Poem by William Shakespeare

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sonnet 67</span> Poem by William Shakespeare

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<i>The Tempest</i> Play by William Shakespeare

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According to Dr. Naseeb Shaheen, Shakespeare, in writing his plays, "seldom borrows biblical references from his sources, even when those sources contain many references." Roy Battenhouse notes that the Shakespearean tragedy "frequently echoes Bible language or paradigm, even when the play's setting is pagan." Similarly, Peter Milward notes that despite their secular appearance, Shakespeare's plays "conceal an undercurrent of religious meaning which belongs to their deepest essence." Further, Milward maintains that although Shakespeare "may have felt obliged by the circumstances of the Elizabethan stage to avoid Biblical or other religious subjects for his plays," such obligation "did not prevent him from making full use of the Bible in dramatizing his secular sources and thus infusing into them a Biblical meaning." Milward continues that, in writing his plays, Shakespeare "shows the universal relevance of the Bible both to the reality of human life 'in this harsh world' and to its ideal in the heart of God." Steven Marx suggests "a thorough familiarity with the Scriptures" is a prerequisite to understanding the Biblical references in the plays, and that the plays' references to the Bible "illuminate fresh and surprising meanings in the biblical text." Marx further notes that "it is possible that Shakespeare sometimes regarded his own role of playwright and performer as godlike, his own book as potent and capacious as 'The Book'." It is important to note, as a recent study points out “The diversity of versions reflected in Shakespeare’s writing indicates that ‘Shakespeare’s Bible’ cannot be taken for granted as unitary, since it consists of a network of different translations”

Aaron Posner is an American playwright and theatre director. He was co-founder of the Arden Theatre Company in Philadelphia and was the artistic director of Two River Theater from 2006 to 2010. He has directed over 100 productions at major regional theater companies across the country. He has won six Helen Hayes Awards, two Barrymore Awards, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the John Gassner Prize, a Joseph Jefferson Award, a Bay Area Theatre Award, and an Eliot Norton Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Witmore</span>

Michael Witmore is a Shakespearean, scholar of rhetoric, digital humanist, and director of a library and cultural institution. In 2011, he was appointed the director of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., where he continues to serve.

References

  1. "Lynne Kositsky, author". Kids Can Press Archived 2016-06-09 at the Wayback Machine , 2004. Accessed 26 August 2013.
  2. Kirkus Reviews, February 2004.
  3. "For Young Readers" in Book World, Washington Post , 11 April 2004.
  4. Review. The Horn Book Magazine , Boston, May/June 2004.
  5. Bush, Elizabeth. Review. Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books. Johns Hopkins University Press, University of Illinois. May 2004.
  6. Review. School Library Journal , May 2004.
  7. "Suggested Reading" Archived 2013-09-21 at the Wayback Machine , "Golden Lads & Lasses": Shakespeare for Children Archived 2011-02-17 at the Wayback Machine , Folger Shakespeare Library, 21 January 21 through 13 May 2006.