David Hershinow is Director of the Writing Center at the City University of New York Graduate Center.

Honest counselor and bitter fool, fearless speaker of truth to power and tub-dwelling public masturbator, the Cynic philosopher Diogenes enlivens some of Shakespeare’s most compelling plays, including King Lear, As You Like It and Twelfth Night. In this timely and fascinating study, David Hershinow traces the Cynic challenge to power and conformity backwards to Shakespeare’s sources in ancient philosophy and forwards to Hegel and Foucault, discovering in the Cynic stance the enduring allure of a criticism capable of changing the world through the sheer audacity of matching blistering words to outrageous deeds.

• AcknowledgementsIntroductionPart I: Our Cynic Legacy1. Cynicism and the Courage of Truth2. The Realist Turn: Parrhêsia, Character, and the Limits of DidacticismPart II: Shakespeare’s Cynics3. Shakespeare’s Bitter Fool: The Politics and Aesthetics of Free Speech4. Cynicism, Melancholy, and Hamlet’s Memento Moriae5. Cash is King: Timon, Diogenes, and the Search for Sovereign FreedomCodaIndex

David Hershinow is Director of the Writing Center at the City University of New York Graduate Center.

Honest counselor and bitter fool, fearless speaker of truth to power and tub-dwelling public masturbator, the Cynic philosopher Diogenes enlivens some of Shakespeare’s most compelling plays, including King Lear, As You Like It and Twelfth Night. In this timely and fascinating study, David Hershinow traces the Cynic challenge to power and conformity backwards to Shakespeare’s sources in ancient philosophy and forwards to Hegel and Foucault, discovering in the Cynic stance the enduring allure of a criticism capable of changing the world through the sheer audacity of matching blistering words to outrageous deeds.

• AcknowledgementsIntroductionPart I: Our Cynic Legacy1. Cynicism and the Courage of Truth2. The Realist Turn: Parrhêsia, Character, and the Limits of DidacticismPart II: Shakespeare’s Cynics3. Shakespeare’s Bitter Fool: The Politics and Aesthetics of Free Speech4. Cynicism, Melancholy, and Hamlet’s Memento Moriae5. Cash is King: Timon, Diogenes, and the Search for Sovereign FreedomCodaIndex

David Hershinow is Director of the Writing Center at the City University of New York Graduate Center.

Honest counselor and bitter fool, fearless speaker of truth to power and tub-dwelling public masturbator, the Cynic philosopher Diogenes enlivens some of Shakespeare’s most compelling plays, including King Lear, As You Like It and Twelfth Night. In this timely and fascinating study, David Hershinow traces the Cynic challenge to power and conformity backwards to Shakespeare’s sources in ancient philosophy and forwards to Hegel and Foucault, discovering in the Cynic stance the enduring allure of a criticism capable of changing the world through the sheer audacity of matching blistering words to outrageous deeds.

• AcknowledgementsIntroductionPart I: Our Cynic Legacy1. Cynicism and the Courage of Truth2. The Realist Turn: Parrhêsia, Character, and the Limits of DidacticismPart II: Shakespeare’s Cynics3. Shakespeare’s Bitter Fool: The Politics and Aesthetics of Free Speech4. Cynicism, Melancholy, and Hamlet’s Memento Moriae5. Cash is King: Timon, Diogenes, and the Search for Sovereign FreedomCodaIndex