In the 1980s and 1990s, New Historicism and Cultural Materialism were two related and very influential schools of literary theory. Below are a few influential titles:
- Radical Tragedy: Religion, Ideology and Power in the Drama of Shakespeare and His Contemporaries by Jonathan Dollimore (first edition, 1984),
- Political Shakespeare: New Essays in Cultural Materialism, edited by Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield (1985),
- Alternative Shakespeares, edited by John Drakakis (first edition, 1985),
- The Subject of Tragedy: Identity and Difference in Renaissance Drama by Catherine Belsey (1985),
- Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt (1983),
- Shakespearean Negotiations: The Circulation of Social Energy in Renaissance England by Stephen Greenblatt (1989),
- Learning to Curse: Essays in Early Modern Culture by Stephen Greenblatt (1990).
Of course, all schools of literary theory have studies Shakespeare and his contemporaries, but New Historicism and Cultural Materialism seemed to intensify this interest. Is this impression correct? If yes, why was this?