William Shakespeare: King Lear: King Lear

· Humanities-Ebooks
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112
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About this ebook

A theatre-based study guide to Shakespeare's greatest play, emphasising the conditions of Jacobethan production, textual variations, and aspects of modern performance, rather than the background of ideas or critical interpretations. This book aims to introduce students (including those with little or no prior experience of the field) to the worlds of Shakespeare and his theatre revealed in King Lear. It begins by ‘Approaching Shakespeare’ as utterly a man of the theatre, a professional actor before he was a playwright and a resident dramatist who knew intimately the actors for whom he wrote. It continues by discussing ‘King Lear’ in that light.The middle chapters look in detail at the ‘Actors and Players’ of the drama, and at Shakespeare’s favourite ‘Acts and Devices’ as deployed within it. A final chapter considers the concept of 'comedic agony'. The annotated Bibliography includes the current major editions, major film-adaptations, and a selection of both the best criticism and the most useful websites.

About the author

John Lennard took his B.A. and D.Phil. at Oxford University, and his M.A. at Washington University in St Louis. He has taught for the Universities of London, Cambridge, and Notre Dame, and for the Open University, and was Professor of British & American Literature at the University of the West Indies—Mona, 2004–09.

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