Trevor H. Howard-Hill, Ed. Oxford Shakespeare Concordances. The Merchant of Venice, xviii+287 pp. As You Like It. xii+274 pp. All's Well That Ends Well. xiv+302pp. The Winter's Tale, xiv+333 pp. Twelfth Night, xii+260 pp. The Taming of the Shrew, xvi+268 pp. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969. $7 each. A Midsummer Night's Dream, xiv+227 pp. Love's Labour's Lost, xiv+302 pp. Much Ado About Nothing. xiv+ 290 pp. King John, xii+275 pp. I Henry VI. xii+294 pp. II Henry VI. xii+339 pp. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970. $8 each.

1972 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 366-369
Author(s):  
James G. McManaway
Keyword(s):  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Winter's Tale ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Winter's Tale ◽  
Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Henry Vi ◽  
Love's Labour's Lost

5. Shakespeare and comic form

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanley Wells
Keyword(s):  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
As You Like It ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
A Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Love's Labour's Lost

Nearly half of Shakespeare’s plays, extending throughout his career, are written in comic form though they play a wide range of variations on it. ‘Shakespeare and comic form’ describes the five earliest as the lightest in tone, but in the five that follow, Shakespeare introduces an antagonist who must be expelled before the play can end happily. The later comedies were written for the Lord Chamberlain’s Men. The plays considered are The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Taming of the Shrew, The Comedy of Errors, Love’s Labour’s Lost, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Merchant of Venice, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Much Ado About Nothing, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night.

The Return from the Dead

2021 ◽  
pp. 148-175
Author(s):  
Kent Cartwright
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Winter's Tale ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Winter's Tale ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Tempest ◽  
The Dead

Chapter 5 argues for the lingering power of medieval values and imaginative forms in their relation to characters who seemingly return from the dead. Criticism has not recognized the extent of this motif in the comedies or the way that it figures in their ongoing actions as well as their endings. Among other values, return from the dead showcases the efficacy of desire on the part of those bereft and the sense of radiant new life that the revenant sometimes acquires. While this motif is usually oriented towards Shakespeare’s late romances, such as Pericles, The Winter’s Tale, and The Tempest, it is strikingly pervasive, influential, and mysterious in the earlier comedies, as suggested by revenant characters ranging from Two Gentlemen’s Julia to All’s Well’s Helen. The chapter draws examples extensively from the comedies, including Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, and Twelfth Night. The motif lends uncanny power, emotional and intellectual depth, and memorability to Shakespearean comedy. It likewise helps us understand the persistence of medieval values into the early modern period.

Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; The Merchant of Venice. Edited by Charles Edelman. $65 cloth; Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; The Taming of the Shrew. Edited by Elizabeth Schafer. $65 cloth; Shakespeare in Production. Series edited by Jacky Bratton and Julie Hankey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002; King Henry V. Edited by Emma Smith. $23 paper.

2004 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 158-161
Author(s):  
Michael Flachmann
Keyword(s):  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Romeo And Juliet ◽  
Henry V ◽  
Twelfth Night ◽  
Midsummer Night's Dream ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Tempest ◽  
As You Like It

In their “Editors' Preface” to the Cambridge University Press Shakespeare in Production series, J. S. Bratton and Julie Hankey proudly describe the “comprehensive dossier of materials,” including “eye-witness accounts, contemporary criticism, promptbook marginalia, stage business, cuts, additions and rewritings,” that make up the heart of this brilliant and exceptionally useful collection of Shakespeare editions. Conceived by Jeremy Treglown and first published by Junction Books, the series was later printed by Bristol Classical Press as Plays in Performance, though none of the original four titles remains in print. Already published in the descendant Cambridge Shakespeare in Production series are nine plays—A Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado about Nothing, Antony and Cleopatra, Hamlet, The Tempest, King Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice—with Macbeth, Twelfth Night, Troilus and Cressida, Othello, and As You Like It forthcoming.

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