Kategoria BISAC: Drama >> Shakespeare

Touching viewers and readers with his presentation of social, moral, and political issues, Shakespeare holds ageless and unequaled appeal primarily because of the universal themes at the heart of his dramatic works. Shakespeare scholar Victor Cahn takes a unique approach to exploring the plays by identifying and explicating the themes that recur throughout the canon. Written in lively language, each of the 35 essays explores a core theme or topic and discusses its implications in several key plays in which it figures prominently. This user-friendly guide not only allows readers to better...

This comprehensive guide includes a discussion of the play's textual history, analyses of its various contexts and sources of influence, an examination of its dramatic structure, a detailed plot summary, a discussion of major themes and critical approaches, and a look at major productions from the 16th through the 20th century.

Shakespeare's "As You Like It" continues to captivate audiences some 400 years after it was written. This reference is a comprehensive guide to the play. Beginning with a discussion of the play's textual history, the guide analyzes its various contexts and...

"The Tempest" was first published in 1623 and is probably the last play Shakespeare wrote by himself. The product of his artistic maturity, it has inspired a variety of modern adaptations and remains one of his most popular plays. While its plot is fairly straightforward, "The Tempest" addresses numerous issues and topics current in the 17th century, such as magic and colonialism. Scholars, in turn, have responded by generating a vast body of criticism. This reference is a comprehensive guide to the play.

The volume begins with a brief consideration of the play's textual history,...

As the world's greatest author, Shakespeare has attracted attention from scholars and laypersons alike. But more and more people have questioned whether the historical Shakespeare wrote the plays popularly attributed to him. While other books on the subject have argued that some other particular person, such as the Earl of Oxford, wrote the plays, this is the first book in over 80 years to comprehensively revisit the authorship question without an ideological bias, the first to introduce new evidence, and the first to undertake a systematic comparative analysis with other literary...

"Love's Labour's Lost" has had a puzzling history. Until the 1950s it was generally considered one of Shakespeare's earliest plays, and it was one of his most vilified until the 20th century. Perhaps more than any other Shakespearean play, it explores the power and limitations of language, and this blatant concern for language led many early critics to believe that it was the work of a playwright just learning his art. Because of its linguistic density, it is one of Shakespeare's most demanding plays, and this difficulty helps account for its initial unpopularity. But modern critics have...