Schools and universities are fast becoming managerial 'courts' of learning in which educators and students are system creatures busily fulfilling system protocols. Any teacher or academic yearning for fresh and authentic approaches to their discipline must first find ways to imagine possibilities beyond the system's limits.This book sounds the depths of the problem in respect to Literary Studies and proposes strategies for effecting voluntary 'exile' from court in pursuit of more i...

Coriolanus is the last and most intriguing of Shakespeare's Roman tragedies. Critics, directors and actors have long been bewitched by this gripping character study of a warrior that Rome can neither tolerate nor do without. Caius Martius Coriolanus is a terrifying war machine in battle, a devoted son to a wise and ambitious mother at home, and an inflammatory scorner of the rights and rites of the common people. This Critical Reader opens up the extraordinary range of interpretat...

A foolproof, enormously fun method of teaching your children the classic works of William Shakespeare, by a Tony Award–winning playwright—now featuring two new chapters“You and your children will be transformed by the magic and mystery of Shakespeare and his stories in an instant.”—Sir Derek Jacobi, CBEWinner of the Falstaff Award for Best Shakespeare BookTo know some Shakespeare provides a head start in life. His p...

The Oxford Shakespeare General Editor: Stanley Wells The Oxford Shakespeare offer authoritative texts from leading scholars in editions designed to interpret and illuminate the plays for modern readers - a new, modern-spelling text, collated and edited from the early texts - wide-ranging introduction discusses the play's historical contexts, political significance, characters, sources, and language - detailed stage history designed to meet the needs of students and theatre...

“[Ron Rosenbaum] is one of the most original journalists and writers of our time.”–David RemnickIn The Shakespeare Wars, Ron Rosenbaum gives readers an unforgettable way of rethinking the greatest works of the human imagination. As he did in his groundbreaking Explaining Hitler, he shakes up much that we thought we understood about a vital subject and renews our sense of excitement and urgency. He gives us a Shakespeare book like no other. Rather than raking over wo...

This book tells the story of the Royal Shakespeare Company's acclaimed and influential project to transform the teaching of Shakespeare in schools. It examines their approaches to making his plays more accessible, enjoyable and relevant to young people, describing the innovative classroom practices that the Company has pioneered and locating these within a clearly articulated theory of learning. It also provides evidence of their impact on children and young people's experience of Shakespe...

The greatest sonnets ever written, by the greatest poet and playwright in the English language

An ideal reference companion for students and enthusiasts of Shakespeare, this informative and entertaining Miscellany gives a wealth of contextual and biographical information to enhance your understanding and enjoyment of his work. There is an entry for every play, summarising its plot and outlining its major characters and themes. Whether you need to know the plot of Cymbeline, the names of characters in As You Like It, or something about the actors Shakespeare wrote f...

John Astington brings the acting style of the Shakespearean period to life, describing and analysing the art of the player in the English professional theatre between Richard Tarlton and Thomas Betterton. The book pays close attention to the cultural context of stage playing, the critical language used about it, and the kinds of training and professional practice employed in the theatre at various times over the course of roughly one hundred years - 1558–1660. Perfect for courses, this sur...

First published in 1968. This re-issues the revised edition of 1979.The Artistry of Shakespeare's Prose is the first detailed study of the use of prose in the plays. It begins by defining the different dramatic and emotional functions which Shakespeare gave to prose and verse, and proceeds to analyse the recurrent stylistic devices used in his prose. The general and particular application of prose is then studied through all the plays, in roughly chronological order.

While much has been written on Descartes' theory of mind and ideas, no systematic study of his theory of sensory representation and misrepresentation is currently available in the literature. Descartes and the Puzzle of Sensory Misrepresentation is an ambitious attempt to fill this gap. It argues against the established view that Cartesian sensations are mere qualia by defending the view that they are representational; it offers a descriptivist-causal account of their representati...

How did Elizabethan and Jacobean acting companies create their visual and aural effects? What materials were available to them and how did they influencestaging and writing? What impact did the sensations of theatre have on early modern audiences? How did the construction of the playhouses contribute to technological innovations in the theatre? What effect might these innovations have had on the writing of plays?Shakespeare's Theatres and The Effects of Performance is a landmark co...