Shakespeare High and Low

Jeffrey Knapp is Distinguished Professor of the Graduate School at the University of California, Berkeley. The recipient of numerous awards for both scholarship and teaching, he has written extensively on Shakespeare, in An Empire Nowhere (1992), Shakespeare’s Tribe (2002), Shakespeare Only (2009) and Pleasing Everyone (2017).

Dramatic, energetic, humane, witty, able to appeal to a wide audience without ever compromising intelligence, nuance or sophistication – Jeffrey Knapp's new introduction to Shakespearean drama demonstrates many of the characteristics it cherishes in the plays it analyses. A wonderfully persuasive and accessible introduction to eleven of the best scripts ever written.

• AcknowledgementsSeries Editors' PrefaceA Note on PronounsIntroduction: Shakespeare and His Audience1. Shakespeare’s Society and Theater2. Shakespeare’s Life on the Stage3. The Comedy of Errors: Style as Comedy4. The Comedy of Errors: Identity and the Marketplace5. A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Heterosexuality as Perversity6. A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Loving Difference7. The Merchant of Venice: Money Talks8. The Merchant of Venice: Turning Less into More9. As You Like It: Is Anyone Better Than Anyone Else?10. As You Like It: Acting Like Yourself11. Richard II: Royalty as Theater12. Richard II: The King’s Multiplicity13. 1 Henry IV: Nation and Self Divided14. 1 Henry IV: Recreating the Prince15. Hamlet: The Death of Fathers16. Hamlet: Something Within17. Hamlet: Hamlet’s Mystique18. Measure for Measure: Self-Usurpation19. Measure for Measure: Craft Against Vice20. Othello: Heterosexuality as Tragedy21. Othello: Who Is the Real Othello?22. Othello: Killing for Loving23. The Winter’s Tale: The One vs. the Many24. The Winter’s Tale: Bearing Children25. The Winter’s Tale: The Resurrection of Comedy26. The Tempest: Playwright as Tyrant27. The Tempest: Gaining Through LossFurther ReadingSelected Performances on DVDIndex