In two magnificent and authoritative volumes, Harold C. Goddard takes readers on a tour through the works of William Shakespeare, celebrating his incomparable plays and unsurpassed literary genius. Goddard writes of Shakespeare with an unabashed love bordering on adoration. He was a Quaker who taught at Bryn Mawr, and his tone is that of a wise and affectionate teacher who would rather impart his enthusiasm than impose his ideas; he is fond of quoting William Blake’s saying that “enthusiastic admiration is the first principle of knowledge, and the last.” He never sounds academic.
Act by act, scene by scene, each Shakespeare Explained guide creates a total immersion experience in the plot development, characters, and language of the specific play.
Shakespeare, Madness, and Music: Scoring Insanity in Cinematic Adaptations
Shakespeare, Madness, and Music: Scoring Insanity in Cinematic Adaptations examines the use of music in the three political tragedies of William Shakespeare: Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear. Each chapter presents the musical treatment of individual characters afflicted with or feigning madness_Hamlet, Ophelia, Lady Macbeth, King Lear, and Edgar_offering analysis and interpretation of the music used to underscore, belie, or otherwise inform or invoke the characters' states of mind and providing a fascinating indication of culture and society, as well as the thoughts and ideas of individual directors, composers, and actors.
The Taming of the Shrew (Bloom's Shakespeare Through the Ages)
The "Taming of the Shrew" remains one of Shakespeare's most popular comedies. The loving "battle of the sexes" between its protagonists, Kate and Petruchio, is a theme of nearly universal relevance in Western literature. This invaluable new study guide to one of Shakespeare's greatest plays contains a selection of the finest criticism through the centuries on "The Taming of the Shrew". Students will also benefit from the additional features included in this volume, such as an introduction by Harold Bloom, an accessible summary, analysis of key passages, a comprehensive list of characters, a biography of Shakespeare, and more.
This volume provides an accessible, wide-ranging and informed introduction to Shakespeare's history and Roman plays. It is attentive throughout to the plays as they have been performed over the centuries since they were written. The first part offers accounts of the genre of the history play, of Renaissance historiography, of pageants and masques, and of women's roles, as well as comparisons with history plays in Spain and the Netherlands. Chapters in the second part look at individual plays as well as other Shakespearean texts which are closely related to the histories. The Companion offers a full bibliography, genealogical tables, and a list of principal and recurrent characters.
