Actors, Directors, & Theater Professionals, Shakespeare - Plays, History, & Criticism, English Drama - 16th-17th Century - Elizabethan & Jacobean Eras - Shakespeare - Literary Criticism, Great Britain - Theater - History & Criticism, Individual Theaters a
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Overview
The Winter's Tale is Shakespeare's most perfectly realized tragi-comedy, as notable for its tragic intensity as for its comic grace and, throughout, for the richness and complexity of its poetry. It concludes, moreover, with the most daring and moving reconciliation scene in all Shakespeare's plays. Though the title may suggest an escapist fantasy, recent criticism has seen in the play a profoundly realist psychology and a powerful commentary on the violence implicit in family relationships and deep, long-lasting friendships. Stephen Orgel's edition considers the play in relation to Renaissance conceptions of both dramatic genre and the family, traces the changing critical and theatrical attitudes towards it, and places its psychological and dramatic conflicts within the Jacobean cultural and political context. The commentary pays special attention to the play's linguistic complexity, and the edition also includes a complete reprint of Shakespeare's source, Pandosto, by Robert Greene.Editorials
VOYA -
This edition of the play, part of the Oxford School Shakespeare series, presents Shakespeare's unabridged tragicomedy with thorough supplementary notes (parallel to script), vocabulary, and brief scene synopses. Scattered pen/ink sketches illustrate a few scenes. Large pages might make this paperback more reader-friendly than some. A lengthy commentary introducing the play could be useful to students already familiar with it. Following the text of the play, the editor discusses source material, demonstrating Shakespeare's use of borrowed ideas. Several paragraphs of criticism inform students how readers/viewers from Samuel Johnson (1765) to Harold C. Goddard (1951) viewed the play. Supplementary material includes a nineteenth century actress sharing ideas about working on the play with famed actor Macready, and a musical score for songs in the play. Ten pages titled Classwork and Examinations offer a variety of traditional teaching methods for instructors (discussion, character study, essays, etc.) The volume closes with a frank biographical sketch of Shakespeare, which admits to the dearth of facts and the necessary speculation. Illus. Source Notes. Chronology. VOYA Codes: 3Q 2P S (Readable without serious defects, For the YA with a special interest in the subject, Senior High-defined as grades 10 to 12).Book Details
Published
July 19, 1984
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Pages
32
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780521277532