During Shakespeare's lifetime, Henry IV was his most popular play. Today, Sir John Falstaff still towers above Shakespeare's other comic inventions. This edition considers the play in the context of various critical approaches, offers a history of the play in performance from Shakespeare's time to ours, and provides useful information on its historical background. Readers will also find detailed commentary on individual words and phrases, and selections from Shakespeare's sources. About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has...
During Shakespeare's lifetime, Henry IV was his most popular play. Today, Sir John Falstaff still towers above Shakespeare's other comic inve...
Many readers first encounter Shakespeare's plays in a book rather than a theater. Yet Shakespeare was through and through a man of the stage. So what do we lose when we leave Shakespeare the practitioner behind, and what do we learn when we think about his plays as dramas to be performed?
David Bevington answers these questions with This Wide and Universal Theater, which explores how Shakespeare's plays were produced both in his own time and in succeeding centuries. Making use of historical documents and the play scripts themselves, Bevington brings Shakespeare's original...
Many readers first encounter Shakespeare's plays in a book rather than a theater. Yet Shakespeare was through and through a man of the stage. So wh...
This book takes a new look at the courtly masque--a unique combination of music, dance, speech, and elaborate costume--in early-seventeenth-century England. The essays, written by distinguished scholars from around the world, present an interdisciplinary approach, with experts on dance, music, visual spectacle and politics all addressing the masque from the point of view of their speciality. Together they reveal how rival factions at the courts of James I and of Charles I represented their clash of viewpoints through dancing and spectacle.
This book takes a new look at the courtly masque--a unique combination of music, dance, speech, and elaborate costume--in early-seventeenth-century En...
This collection of essays adopts a novel, interdisciplinary approach to a diverse group of texts composed in London during the Renaissance. Eight literary scholars and eight historians from two continents have been paired to write companion essays on each text. This original method opens up rich insights into London's social, political, and cultural life which would have eluded members of either discipline working in isolation. 'Theatrical' is taken to be a very flexible term, and is applied to the civic rituals and public spectacles of the capital (for example, the execution of King Charles...
This collection of essays adopts a novel, interdisciplinary approach to a diverse group of texts composed in London during the Renaissance. Eight lite...
For this updated edition, David Bevington has included in his introductory section a thorough consideration of recent critical and stage interpretations of Antony and Cleopatra, demonstrating how the theatrical design and imagination of this play make it one of Shakespeare's most remarkable tragedies. The edition is attentive throughout to the play as theatre: a detailed, illustrated account of the stage history is followed, in the commentary, by discussion of staging options offered by the text. An updated reading list completes the edition. First Edition Hb (1990) 0-521-25256-3 First...
For this updated edition, David Bevington has included in his introductory section a thorough consideration of recent critical and stage interpretatio...
William Shakespeare David Bevington David Scott Kastan
This wisely funny comedy, which contains some of Shakespeare's loveliest poetry, contrasts a court's world of envy and rivalry with a forest's world of compassion and harmony. In the Forest of Arden, the banished young heroine, Rosalind, disguised as a gentleman farmer, encounters an extraordinary assemblage of characters, including a fool, a malcontent traveler, her own banished father, and the banished young man she loves. Romantic happiness triumphs, even as we laugh at the excesses of love, at the ways of court and countryside, indeed, at everything, in this masterpiece of comic writing....
This wisely funny comedy, which contains some of Shakespeare's loveliest poetry, contrasts a court's world of envy and rivalry with a forest's world o...
William Shakespeare David Bevington David Scott Kastan
A triumphantly patriotic play that also casts a critical eye at war and warriors, this great epic drama depicts a charismatic ruler in a time of national struggle. The young King Henry's victory over the French despite overwhelming odds creates a spectacle of action, color, and thundering battles. Whether the warrior-king is urging his men "Once more unto the breach, dear friends," or wooing Katharine of France, Henry is magnificently adapted to the role he must play in England's greatness. Henry V represents the culmination of Shakespeare's art as a writer of historical drama....
A triumphantly patriotic play that also casts a critical eye at war and warriors, this great epic drama depicts a charismatic ruler in a time of natio...
William Shakespeare David Bevington David Scott Kastan
This is one of Shakespeare's darkest comedies, for the romantic story of a young man, Bassanio, who has squandered his fortune and must borrow money to woo the wealthy lady he loves is set against the more disturbing story of the Jewish moneylender Shylock and his demand for the "pound of flesh" owed him by the Venetian merchant, Antonio. Here pathos and farce combine with moral complexity and romantic entanglement to display the extraordinary power and range of Shakespeare at his best. Each Edition Includes: - Comprehensive explanatory notes - Vivid introductions and the most...
This is one of Shakespeare's darkest comedies, for the romantic story of a young man, Bassanio, who has squandered his fortune and must borrow money t...
William Shakespeare David Bevington David Scott Kastan
A robust and bawdy battle of the sexes, this ever popular comedy captivates audiences with outrageous humor as Katharina, the shrew, engages in a contest of wills-and love-with her bridegroom, Petruchio. Their boisterous conflict is set off against a more conventional romantic plot involving the wooing of Katharina's lovely and compliant sister, Bianca. Rich with the psychological themes of identity and transformation, the play is quintessentially lighthearted, filled with visual gags, witty repartee, and unmatched theatrical brilliance from Petruchio's demand, "Kiss me, Kate " to the final...
A robust and bawdy battle of the sexes, this ever popular comedy captivates audiences with outrageous humor as Katharina, the shrew, engages in a cont...
William Shakespeare David Bevington David Scott Kastan
This joyous play, the last comedy of Shakespeare's career, sums up his stagecraft with a display of seemingly effortless skill. Prospero, exiled Duke of Milan, living on an enchanted island, has the opportunity to punish and forgive his enemies when he raises a tempest that drives them ashore as well as to forestall a rebellion, to arrange the meeting of his daughter, Miranda, with an eminently suitable young prince, and, more important, to relinquish his magic powers in recognition of his advancing age. Richly filled with music and magic, romance and comedy, the play's theme of love and...
This joyous play, the last comedy of Shakespeare's career, sums up his stagecraft with a display of seemingly effortless skill. Prospero, exiled Duke ...
