A Companion to Shakespeares Works, Volume I: The Tragedies

This four–volume Companion to Shakespeare′s Works, compiled as a single entity, offers a uniquely comprehensive snapshot of current Shakespeare criticism. Complementing David Scott Kastan′s A Companion to Shakespeare (1999), which focused on Shakespeare as an author in his historical context, these volumes examine each of his plays and major poems using all the resources of contemporary criticism from performance studies to feminist, historicist, and textual analyses. Scholars from all over the world – Australia, Canada, France, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and United States – have joined in the writing of new essays addressing virtually the whole of Shakespeare′s canon from a rich variety of critical perspectives. A mixture of younger and more established scholars, their work reflects some of the most interesting research currently being conducted in Shakespeare studies. Arguing for the persistence and utility of genre as a rubric for teaching and writing about Shakespeare′s works, the editors have organized the four volumes in relation to generic categories: namely, the tragedies, the histories, the comedies, and the poems, problem comedies and late plays. Each volume thus contains individual essays on all texts in the relevant category as well as more general essays looking at critical issues and approaches more widely relevant to the genre. This ambitious project offers a provocative roadmap to Shakespeare studies at the dawning of the twentieth–first century. This companion to Shakespeare′s tragedies contains original essays on every tragedy from Titus Andronicus to Coriolanus as well as thirteen additional essays on such topics as Shakespeare′s Roman tragedies, Shakespeare′s tragedies on film, Shakespeare′s tragedies of love, Hamlet in performance, and tragic emotion in Shakespeare.

Notes on Contributors. Introduction. 1."A Rarity Most Beloved": Shakespeare′s and the Idea of Tragedy: David Kastan. 2. The Tragedies Of Shakespeare′s Contemporaries: Martin Coyle. 3. Shakespearean Tragedy And The History Of Emotion: Kathryn Rowe. 4. The Tragic Hero As Divided Subject: Catherine Belsey. 5. Disjointed Times And Half–Remembered Truths In Shakespearean Tragedy: Philippa Berry. 6. Shakespeare′s Tragedies Of Love: Othello, Romeo, And Antony: Sasha Roberts. 7.Histories Of Heroism: Changing Conceptions Of Hamlet As Stage Hero: Bernice Kliman. 8. Multiple Text Tragedies And Why They Matter: Graham Holderness. 9. Shakespearean Tragedy And Religious Identity: Richard Mccoy. 10. Shakespeare′s Roman Tragedies: Gordon Braden. 11. The Geographies Of Shakespearean Tragedy: Jerry Brotton. 12. Classic Film Versions Of Shakespeare′s Tragedies: Polanski′s Macbeth. Olivier′s Hamlet And Othello, Zefferelli′s Romeo And Juliet: Kenneth Rothwell. 13. Contemporary Film Versions Of Shakespeare′s Tragedies: Luhrmann′s Romeo And Juliet, Taymore′s Titus, Branagh′s Hamlet: Mark Burnett. 14. Titus: Ian Smith. 15. Romeo: Naomi Liebler. 16. Hamlet: Michael Neill. 17. Julius Caesar: Rebecca Bushnell. 18. Othello: Kim F Hall. 19. Lear: Kiernan Ryan. 20. Macbeth: Kate Mcluskie. 21. Antony And Cleopatra: Jyotsna Singh. 22. Timon: Hugh Grady. 23. Coriolanus: Cynthia Marshall. Index.

Jean E. Howard is William E. Ransford Professor of English at Columbia University and a past president of the Shakespeare Association of America. She is an editor of The Norton Shakespeare, and author of, among other works The Stage and Social Struggle in Early Modern England (1994) and, with Phyllis Rackin, of Engendering a Nation: A Feminist Account of Shakespeare’s English Histories (1997). Richard Dutton is currently Professor of English at Lancaster University, author of Mastering the Revels: the Regulation and Censorship of Renaissance Drama (1991) and Licensing, Censorship and Authorship in Early Modern England:Buggeswords (2000). He is editor of the Palgrave Literary Lives series. From 2003, he will be Professor of English at Ohio State University.