Shakespeare on film : film editing and authorship : 'It is only in the editing room that the director has the power of a true artist'.

The purpose of the thesis is to question the hegemony of auteurist, director-based criticisms of Shakespearean films by rescuing the film-editor from anonymity. By drawing my attention to the determining, yet largely disregarded work of editorial creation, I offer a reading of a selection of Shakespearean films that acknowledges the centrality of collaborative work in representing Shakespeare on film. In order to recreate the editor as a 'collaborative auteur', I propose to trace the authorial signature(s) of the editore(s) by examining and identifying in which ways and according to which specific patterns the Shakespearean pre-texts are transformed into 'Shakespearean' film texts.