The play opens with a dispute between Henry Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford, and Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk. Bolingbroke has accused Mowbray of treason, and the two of them exchange insults in the presence of King Richard. After attempts to reconcile them fail, Richard orders them to take part in a traditional chivalric trial by combat. On the field of combat, the king changes his mind and banishes the two men - Bolingbroke for ten years (commuted to six) and Mowbray for life. Then the king makes plans to leave for the wars in Ireland. Before departing, Richard visits the ailing father of...

A messenger from France arrives in the English court, demanding that King John abdicate his throne in favor of his nephew Arthur. The messenger speaks for King Philip of France, who supports Arthur's claim as the rightful heir to the throne; when John refuses to step down, France threatens war. The Bastard and his younger brother enter to dispute their inherited lands. John rules that the Bastard has the right to the lands, because a wife's offspring become a father's heir, no matter who the actual father. John's mother, Eleanor, takes a liking to the Bastard, because it is rumored that his...

In the streets of Verona another brawl breaks out between the servants of the feuding noble families of Capulet and Montague. Benvolio, a Montague, tries to stop the fighting, but is himself embroiled when the rash Capulet, Tybalt, arrives on the scene. After citizens outraged by the constant violence beat back the warring factions, Prince Escalus, the ruler of Verona, attempts to prevent any further conflicts between the families by decreeing death for any individual who disturbs the peace in the future. Romeo, the son of Montague, runs into his cousin Benvolio, who had earlier seen Romeo...

Containing some of the greatest lyric poems in English literature, Shake-speares Sonnets are not just the easy love sentiments of "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day." Many are bleak cries of emotional distress and spiritual exhaustion. They describe the struggle of love and forgiveness against anguish and despair. It is this tragic portrait of human existence that makes the sonnets immortal, Containg all of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets

A Midsummer Night's Dream opens with Theseus and Hippolyta planning their wedding, which takes place in four days. Theseus is upset because time is moving so slowly, but Hippolyta assures him the four days will quickly pass. Their relationship has not always been so loving. Theseus won Hippolyta during a battle. While they discuss their relationship, Egeus enters with his daughter, Hermia, and her two suitors, Lysander and Demetrius. Hermia is in love with Lysander, but her father wants her to marry Demetrius. Lysander argues that he is as good of a match as Demetrius, but Egeus won't listen....

The King of Navarre and his three lords, Berowne, Longaville, and Dumaine, swear an oath to scholarship, which includes fasting and avoiding contact with women for three years. They receive a letter from Don Armado, a Spaniard visiting the King's court, telling them that he has caught Costard, a fool, and Jaquenetta, a country wench, consorting in the park. The King announces Costard's sentence, and he and the lords go off to begin their oath. Don Armado confesses to Moth, his page, that he has fallen in love with Jaquenetta. He writes her a letter that he asks Costard to deliver. Meanwhile,...

Egeon, a merchant of Syracuse, is condemned to death in Ephesus for violating the ban against travel between the two rival cities. As he is led to his execution, he tells the Ephesian Duke, Solinus, that he has come to Syracuse in search of his wife and one of his twin sons, who were separated from him 25 years ago in a shipwreck. The other twin, who grew up with Egeon, is also traveling the world in search of the missing half of their family. (The twins, we learn, are identical, and each has an identical twin slave named Dromio.) The Duke is so moved by this story that he grants Egeon a day...

This drama is one of the great history themed plays by William Shakespeare. The play is dominated by Richard depicted as the evil hunchbacked Duke of Gloucester who becomes King Richard III through a series of terrible acts. Richard kills off his enemies, his kinsmen, his wife and most of his supporters The Wars of the Roses between the Houses of York and Lancaster culminate in the Battle of Bosworth and the defeat of Richard by the Duke of Richmond, who became Henry VII, crying out "My kingdom for a horse.

Titus Andronicus, Roman general, returns from ten years of war with only four out of twenty-five sons left. He has captured Tamora, Queen of the Goths, her three sons, and Aaron the Moor. In obedience to Roman rituals, he sacrifices her eldest son to his own dead sons, which earns him Tamora's unending hatred and her promise of revenge. Tamora is made empress by the new emperor Saturninus. To get back at Titus, she schemes with her lover Aaron to have Titus's two sons framed for the murder of Bassianus, the emperor's brother. Titus's sons are beheaded. Unappeased, she urges her sons Chiron...

Henry enters the court with his various lords. Suffolk has returned from France with Margaret, whom he presents to the king as his new wife. He also brings a peace treaty from France, which Gloucester reads. He falters when he comes to a passage about the French keeping the territories of Anjou and Maine in return for Margaret. Gloucester is upset at this loss of land, once hard-won by Henry V and by the other lords in recent French wars. He prophecies the imminent loss of France and leaves. Beaufort speaks against Gloucester, suggesting to Buckingham and Somerset that they plot to oust him....