The Collected Sonnets of William Shakespeare, Zombie

What if one of literature’s greatest poets was actually a zombie, writing in an Elizabethan world teeming with the undead hiding in plain sight? Inviting readers to see the sublime in the looming apocalypse, this book presents all 154 Shakespearean sonnets (with minor alterations transfigured into “zonnets”) in their horrifying glory, highlighting transcendent themes of love, death, beauty and feasting on the flesh of the living. Each sonnet portrays a zombie encounter, with accompanying vignettes revealing the struggles of undead life in early modern England. Original illustrations by Anna Pagnucci bring the nightmare to life. Shakespeare will never be the same.

Chase Pielak teaches English at Auburn University.
Kyle William Bishop is an associate professor of English and film studies and serves as the Honors Program director at Southern Utah University in Cedar City, Utah. He has presented and published on a number of zombie-related texts and has authored two other monographs with McFarland.

William Shakespeare and Chase Pielak. Series Editor Kyle William Bishop
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 154
Bibliographic Info: 15 photos, index
Copyright Date: 2018
pISBN: 978-1-4766-7115-4
eISBN: 978-1-4766-3130-1
Imprint: McFarland
Series: Contributions to Zombie Studies

Acknowledgments  v
Preface  1
Origin Story of the Zonnets  5
Shakespeare’s Undead Introduction:
Life Is Better Now  13
1. Apocalyptic Beauty  15
2. Hunger  24
3. Increase  34
4. Life’s Better as a Zombie  45
5. Time  54
6. Apocalyptic Living  62
7. Zombaby  71
8. Survivors  79
9. Don’t Die Yet  88
10. Epitaph  97
11. The Horde  106
12. Grave Love  114
13. The Cure  124
14. Falling Apart  133
Index  143