Shakespeare's Comedies: A Guide to Criticism

Emma Smith (Editor)



This Guide introduces students to critical writing on Shakespeare’s comedies over the last four centuries.

• Guides students through four centuries of critical writing on Shakespeare’s history plays.
• Covers both significant early views and recent critical interventions.
• Substantial editorial material links the articles and places them in context.
• Annotated suggestions for further reading allow students to investigate further.

Table of Contents

Preface.
Acknowledgements.

1 The Development of Criticism of Shakespeare's Comedies.

2 Genre.

Marriage as Comic Closure.

False Immortality in Measure for Measure.

3 Language.

Here Follows Prose.

Transfer of Title in Love's Labour's Lost.

4 Gender and Sexuality.

Helena's Bed-trick.

The Homoerotics of Shakespearian.

Comedy.

5 History and Politics.

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?.

Bottom's Up.

6 Performance.

Kate: Interpreting the Silence.

As You Like It.

Index