Shakespeare's Great Stage of Fools

"I have been waiting for the sequel to Jocoserious Joyce for two decades, and here it is, not a moment too soon. The fool’s hour has come round at last, and there is no more capacious, serious guide to foolery and its wisdom than Bell, a master of clowning, an exemplary reader, an unfolder of layer after layer of comedy, and a sensitive listener to its most profound resonances." - Willard Spiegelman, Hughes Professor of English, Southern Methodist University and Editor-in-Chief, Southwest Review

"Shakespeare’s Great Stage of Fools will instruct and delight not only scholars and critics, but all lovers of Shakespeare. Bell has that ‘most rare vision’: he sees the historical and thematic grand picture as well as the beautiful and mysterious details. Like a modern Erasmus, Bell shows how we are all ensnared and yet sometimes saved by folly. His deep insight and superb prose hold a clarifying mirror to Shakespeare’s plays, and to ourselves." - Peter Campion, Editor, Literary Imagination and author of The Lions