Drama : Shakespeare

This is an electronic edition of the complete book complemented by author biography. This booktable of contents linked to every act and scene. *****************. Hamlet is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601. The play, set in Denmark, recounts how Prince Hamlet exacts revenge on his uncle Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet''s father, the King, and then taken the throne and married Hamlet''s mother. The play vividly charts the course of real and feigned madness—from overwhelming grief to seething rage—and explores themes of treachery, revenge, incest, and moral corruption. Despite much literary detective work, the exact year of writing remains in dispute. Three different early versions of the play have survived: these are known as the First Quarto (Q1), the Second Quarto (Q2) and the First Folio (F1). Each has lines, and even scenes, that are missing from the others. Shakespeare probably based Hamlet on the legend of Amleth, preserved by 13th-century chronicler Saxo Grammaticus in his Gesta Danorum and subsequently retold by 16th-century scholar François de Belleforest, and a supposedly lost Elizabethan play known today as the Ur-Hamlet. Given the play''s dramatic structure and depth of characterization, Hamlet can be analyzed, interpreted and argued about from many perspectives. For example, commentators have puzzled for centuries about Hamlet''s hesitation in killing his uncle. Some see it as a plot device to prolong the action, and others see it as the result of pressure exerted by the complex philosophical and ethical issues that surround cold-blooded murder, calculated revenge and thwarted desire. More recently, psychoanalytic critics have examined Hamlet''s unconscious desires, and feminist critics have re-evaluated and rehabilitated the often maligned characters of Ophelia and Gertrude. Hamlet is Shakespeare''s longest play, and among the most powerful and influent more...

Price: $3.99

Shakespeare's classic tragedy of love, madness, and revenge was first enacted in London in 1602. Young Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, is in mourning for his dead father, is visited by his father's ghost telling him that he was murdered by his own brother, Claudius, who then assumed the throne and married Hamlet's mother, Gertrude. Intent on revenge, Hamlet feigns madness and plots to kill Claudius. When he accidentally stabs Polonius, Claudius's counselor, Hamlet is sent into exile--and Polonius's daughter, Ophelia, who had been in love with Hamlet, goes mad from grief and drowns herself. In the climax of the play, old scores are settled at last, and Hamlet's speaks his famous last words: "The rest is silence." Considered one of Shakespeare's greatest plays, HAMLET is part of the well-established tradition of "revenge tragedies" that were popular at the end of the Elizabethan era, but the play transcends all its influences in its examination of justice and duty, and as a subtle portrait of a sensitive young man torn between righteous revenge and his duty as a moral man. more...

Price: $4.95

"I feel that I have spent half my career with one or another Pelican Shakespeare in my back pocket. Convenience, however, is the least important aspect of the new Pelican Shakespeare series. Here is an elegant and clear text for either the study or the rehearsal room, notes where you need them and the distinguished scholarship of the general editors, Stephen Orgel and A. R. Braunmuller who understand that these are plays for performance as well as great texts for contemplation." (Patrick Stewart). The distinguished Pelican Shakespeare series, which has sold more than four million copies, is now completely revised and repackaged. Each volume features:. * Authoritative, reliable texts. * High quality introductions and notes. * New, more readable trade trim size. * An essay on the theatrical world of Shakespeare and essays on Shakespeare's life and the selection of texts more...

Price: $6.00

"I feel that I have spent half my career with one or another Pelican Shakespeare in my back pocket. Convenience, however, is the least important aspect of the new Pelican Shakespeare series. Here is an elegant and clear text for either the study or the rehearsal room, notes where you need them and the distinguished scholarship of the general editors, Stephen Orgel and A. R. Braunmuller who understand that these are plays for performance as well as great texts for contemplation." (Patrick Stewart). The distinguished Pelican Shakespeare series, which has sold more than four million copies, is now completely revised and repackaged. Each volume features:. * Authoritative, reliable texts. * High quality introductions and notes. * New, more readable trade trim size. * An essay on the theatrical world of Shakespeare and essays on Shakespeare's life and the selection of texts more...

Price: $4.95

This Modern Library edition presents all ten histories--each complete and unabridged--in the Shakespearean canon, along with notes and glossary. Here are: King John Richard II Henry IV, Part I Henry IV, Part II Henry V Henry VI, Part I Henry VI, Part II Henry VI, Part III Richard III Henry VIII Included also are the Bard's great narrative poems: Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece, the two works that first established Shakespeare's reputation, plus all 154 of his sonnets. more...

Price: $23.00