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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1895
Publisher by :

ISBN : PRNC:32101068157666

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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 2009-08-26
Publisher by : Bantam Classics

ISBN : 9780307420596

The Taming of the Shrew Robust and bawdy, The Taming of the Shrew captivates audiences with outrageous humor as Katharina, the shrew, engages in a contest of wills–and love–with her bridegroom, Petruchio, in a comedy of unmatched theatrical brilliance, filled with visual gags and witty repartee. A Midsummer Night's Dream Fairy magic, love spells, and an enchanted wood turn the mismatched rivalries of four young lovers into a marvelous mix-up of desire and enchantment, all touched by Shakespeare’s inimitable vision of the intriguing relationship between dreams and the waking world. The Merchant of Venice This dark comedy of love and money contains one of the truly mythic figures in literature–Shylock, the Jewish moneylender. The “pound of flesh” he demands as payment of Antonio’s debt has become a universal metaphor for vengeance. Here, pathos and farce combine with moral complexity and romantic entanglements, to display the extraordinary power and range of Shakespeare at his best. Twelfth Night Set in a topsy-turvy world like a holiday revel, this comedy juxtaposes a romantic plot involving separated twins and mistaken identity with a more satiric one about the humiliation of a pompous killjoy. The hilarity is touched with melancholy, and the play ends, not with laughter, but with a clown’s plaintive song. Each Edition Includes: • Comprehensive explanatory notes • Vivid introductions and the most up-to-date scholarship • Clear, modernized spelling and punctuation, enabling contemporary readers to understand the Elizabethan English • Completely updated, detailed bibliographies and performance histories • An interpretive essay on film adaptations of the play, along with an extensive filmography...

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Author by : Britannica Educational Publishing
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 2012-12-01
Publisher by : Britannica Educational Publishing

ISBN : 9781615309337

In Shakespeare’s time, the term “comedy” did not necessarily denote something funny or amusing. Rather, through such plays such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Merchant of Venice, the playwright examines other defining characteristics of comedic drama—the social interactions of common folks and a focus on the contradictions inherent in everyday life. Readers explore the major themes of Shakespearean comedies, which have enchanted readers and theater-goers alike for centuries....

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Author by : Kenneth Muir
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1965
Publisher by : MacMillan Publishing Company

ISBN : UOM:39015046342807

From the Back Cover: Despite differences between Shakespeare's time and ours in language, in taste, in mores, his comedies still produce that sure sign of success-uninhibited laughter. But, as the critics in this volume ably contend, the world of Shakespearean comedy is made of more than make-believe, quick action, and brilliant repartee. Shakespeare's genius was to probe, delicately but deeply, subtle and enduring characteristics of humanity. Each play is set in a land of its own, yet through these lands move characters recognizable in our own world. The reality of these characters is only enhanced by ethereal creatures of the imagination like Puck and Ariel, who weave about them poetic merriment unsurpassed in comic literature. Among the essays in this volume are: As You Like It / Helen Gardener -- Winter's Tale / Derek Traversi -- Helena / G. Wilson Knight -- Shakespeare's Method: The Merchant of Venice / J. Middleton Murry....

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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1883
Publisher by :

ISBN : UOM:39015082510317

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Author by : Bart van Es
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 2016-03-24
Publisher by : Oxford University Press

ISBN : 9780191034961

From The Two Gentlemen of Verona in the early 1590s to The Two Noble Kinsmen at the end of his career around 1614, Shakespeare wrote at least eighteen plays that can be called 'comedies': a far higher number than that for any other genre in which he wrote. So what is a Shakespearean comedy? We associate these plays with such themes as mistaken identities, happy marriages, and exuberant cross dressing, but how representative are these of the oeuvre as a whole? In this Very Short Introduction, Bart van Es explores the full range of the playwright's comic writing, from the neat classical plotting of early works like The Comedy of Errors to the corrupt world of the so-called problem plays, written in the middle years of Shakespeare's life. Examining Shakespeare's influences and sources, van Es compares his plays to those of his rivals, and looks at the history of the plays in performance, from the biographies of Shakespeare's original actors to the plays' endless reinvention in modern stage productions and in films. Identifying the key qualities that make Shakespearean comedy distinctive, van Es traces the changing nature of Shakespeare's comic writing over the course of a career that spanned nearly a quarter century of theatrical change. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable....

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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1904
Publisher by :

ISBN : BNC:1001933391

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Author by : J. A. BryantJr.
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 2014-07-15
Publisher by : University Press of Kentucky

ISBN : 9780813161488

In Shakespeare's hand the comic mode became an instrument for exploring the broad territory of the human situation, including much that had normally been reserved for tragedy. Once the reader recognizes that justification for such an assumption is presented repeatedly in the earlier comedies -- from The Comedy of Errors to Twelfth Night -- he has less difficulty in dispensing with the currently fashionable classifications of the later comedies as problem plays and romances or tragicomedies and thus in seeing them all as manifestations of a single impulse. Bryant shows how Shakespeare, early and late, dutifully concerned himself with the production of laughter, the presentation of young people in love, and the exploitation of theatrical conventions that might provide a guaranteed response. Yet these matters were incidental to his main business in writing comedy: to examine the implications of an action in which human involvement in the process of living provides the kind of enlightenment that leads to renewal and the continuity of life. With rare foresight, Shakespeare presented a world in which women were as capable of enlightenment as the men who wooed them, and Bryant shows how the female characters frequently preceded their mates in perceiving the way of the world. In most of his comedies Shakespeare also managed to suggest the role of death in life's process; and in some -- even in plays as diverse as A Midsummer Night's Dream, As You Like It, and The Tempest -- he gave hints of a larger process, one without beginning or end, that may well comprehend all our visions -- of comedy, tragedy, and history -- in a single movement....

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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1986-01-01
Publisher by : Conran Octopus

ISBN : 0706427424

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Author by : William Shakespeare
Languange Used : en
Release Date : 1883
Publisher by :

ISBN : HARVARD:32044051763266

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