Edmund Kean’s Celebrity: Assemblage Theory and the Unintended Consequences of Audience Density

This essay will examine theatrical celebrity in early 19th-century England with particular reference to the actor Edmund Kean (1787-1833) and his first season at Drury Lane, 1813-14. His ground-breaking interpretation of Shylock in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice brought him overnight success. Using Manuel DeLanda’s assemblage theory as its main predictive model, the essay argues that celebri…