Recommendations based on "No Fear Shakespeare : Much Ado About Not"

Presents the three classic plays "Salome," "Lady Windermere's Fan," and "The Importance of Being Earnest"

This is a biography of a book: the first collected edition of Shakespeare's plays printed in 1623 and known as the First Folio. It begins with the story of its first purchaser in London in December 1623, and goes on to explore the ways people have interacted with this iconic book over the four hundred years of its history. Throughout the stress is on what we can learn from individual copies now spread around the world about their eventful lives. From ink blots to pet paws, from annotations to wineglass rings, First Folios teem with evidence of their place in different contexts with different priorities. This study offers new ways to understand Shakespeare's reception and the history of the book. Unlike previous scholarly investigations of the First Folio, it is not concerned with the discussions of how the book came into being, the provenance of its texts, or the technicalities of its production. Instead, it reanimates, in narrative style, the histories of this book, paying close attention to the details of individual copies now located around the world - their bindings, marginalia, general condition, sales history, and location - to discuss five major themes: owning, reading, decoding, performing, and perfecting. This is a history of the book that consolidated Shakespeare's posthumous reputation: a reception history and a study of interactions between owners, readers, forgers, collectors, actors, scholars, booksellers, and the book through which we understand and recognize Shakespeare.

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.‘Though this be madness, yet there is method in't.’Considered one of Shakespeare’s most rich and enduring plays, the depiction of its hero Hamlet as he vows to avenge the murder of his father by his brother Claudius is both powerful and complex. As Hamlet tries to find out the truth of the situation, his troubled relationship with his mother comes to the fore, as do the paradoxes in his personality. A play of carefully crafted conflict and tragedy, Shakespeare’s intricate dialogue continues to fascinate audiences to this day.

Taking a curtain call with a live snake in her wig; being painted green and cavorting naked through the Warwickshire countryside; acting opposite a child with a pumpkin on his head... these are just a few things Dame Judi Dench has done in the name of Shakespeare.In this book, Judi tells us about every Shakespearean role she's played throughout her career. Written in dialogue with fellow artist Brendan O'Hea, Judi guides us through Shakespeare's plays with incisive clarity, reveals the secrets behind her rehearsal process and invites us to share in her triumphs, disasters and backstage shenanigans.As Judi herself says 'Shakespeare is an international language, a beacon for humanity, and a bridge across cultures. Everything you have felt or are yet to feel is all in there in his plays.'

Winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize’s 25th Anniversary Winner of Winners awardWhat accounts for Shakespeare’s transformation from talented poet and playwright to one of the greatest writers who ever lived? In this gripping account, James Shapiro sets out to answer this question, "succeed[ing] where others have fallen short." (Boston Globe)1599 was an epochal year for Shakespeare and England. During that year, Shakespeare wrote four of his most famous plays: Henry the Fifth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and, most remarkably, Hamlet; Elizabethans sent off an army to crush an Irish rebellion, weathered an Armada threat from Spain, gambled on a fledgling East India Company, and waited to see who would succeed their aging and childless queen.James Shapiro illuminates both Shakespeare’s staggering achievement and what Elizabethans experienced in the course of 1599, bringing together the news and the intrigue of the times with a wonderful evocation of how Shakespeare worked as an actor, businessman, and playwright. The result is an exceptionally immediate and gripping account of an inspiring moment in history.

The first feature film by the Monty Pythin team is a mock-heroic tale set in mediaeval Britain. This screenplay edition contains just the script and is supplemented by 8 pages of b&w stills from the film.

Rediscover Shakespeare -- the working man of the theater, not the universal bard -- and rediscover his plays as scripts to be performed, not works to be immortalized. Combining the freshly edited texts of the Oxford Edition with lively introductions, this contemporary Shakespeare enables readers to see and read Shakespeare afresh.

Anthology for Music in the Renaissance, part of the Western Music in Context series, is the ideal companion to Music in the Renaissance. Twenty-seven carefully chosen works including an isorhythmic motet by Ciconia, an English carol, a Janequin chanson, and lute composition by Ortiz offer representative examples of the genres and composers of the period. Commentaries following each score present a careful analysis of the music, and online links to purchase and download recordings make listening easier than ever. "

The Complete Works of Shakespeare contains the recognized canon of the bard's plays, and his sonnets and poems. The texts were edited by the late Professor Peter Alexander, making it one of the most authoritative editions, recognized the world over for its clarity and scholarship. Described in the Guardian on its first publication in 1951 as 'a symbol in the history of our national culture', the Collins edition of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare, edited by the late Professor Peter Alexander, has long been established as one of the most authoritative editions of Shakespeare's works, and was chosen by the BBC as the basis for its televised cycle of the plays. The book starts with two specially written articles - a biography of Shakespeare by Germaine Greer and a wide-ranging introduction to Shakespeare theatre by the late Anthony Burgess. Each play is also introduced by academics from Glasgow University, where Professor Alexander undertook his editing. New to this edition is an internet resources section, providing details of the most useful Shakespeare websites. In addition, the invaluable glossary of over 2,500 entries explaining the meaning of obsolete words and phrases (complete with line references) has been expanded and redesigned to make it much easier to use.

Henry V of England, the princely hero of Shakespeare's play, who successfully defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt and came close to becoming crowned King of France, is one of the best known and most compelling monarchs in English history. This new biography takes a fresh look at his entire life and nine year reign, and gives a balanced view of Henry, who is traditionally seen as a great hero but has been more recently depicted as an obsessive egotist or, worse, a ruthless warlord. The book locates Henry's style of kingship in the context of the time, and looks at often neglected other figures who influenced and helped him, such as his father and his uncles, Henry and Thomas Beaufort. John Matusiak shows that the situation confronting Henry at the outset of his reign was far more favourable than is often supposed but that he was nonetheless a man of prodigious gifts whose extraordinary achievements in battle left the deepest possible impression upon his contemporaries.