Combining the latest scientific and philosophical understanding of humankind's place in the world with interpretative methods derived from other politically inflected literary criticism, ecocriticism is providing new insights into literary works both ancient and modern. With case-study analyses of the tragedies, comedies, histories and late romances, this book is a wide-ranging introduction to reading Shakespeare in the light of contemporary ecocritical theory.

Ecocriticism, a theoretical movement examining cultural constructions of Nature in their social and political contexts, is making an increasingly important contribution to our understanding of Shakespeare's plays.
"Green Shakespeare "offers:
- An overview of the concept of ecocriticism
- Detailed ecocritical readings of "Henry V, Macbeth, As You Like It, Antony & Cleopatra, King Lear, Coriolanus, Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale" and "The Tempest"
- Analysis of themes such as nature and human society; food and biological nature; the supernatural and the weather
- A bold argument for a contemporary "EcoShakespeare," taking into account the environmental and political implications of globalization and intellectual property laws
Crossing the boundaries of literary and cultural studies to draw in politics, philosophy and ecology, this volume not only introduces one of the most lively areas of contemporary Shakespeare studies, but also offers a convincing case for Shakespeare's continuing relevance to contemporary theory.

Ecocriticism, a theoretical movement examining cultural constructions of Nature in their social and political contexts, is making an increasingly important contribution to our understanding of Shakespeare 's plays. Gabriel Egan's Green Shakespeare presents:

• an overview of the concept of ecocriticism
• detailed ecocritical readings of Henry V, Macbeth, As You Like It, Antony & Cleopatra, King Lear, Coriolanus, Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter 's Tale and The Tempest
• analysis of themes such as nature and human society; food and biological nature; the supernatural and the weather
• a bold argument for a contemporary EcoShakespeare, taking into account the environmental and political implications of globalization and intellectual property laws.

Crossing the boundaries of literary and cultural studies to draw in politics, philosophy and ecology, this volume not only introduces one of the most lively areas of contemporary Shakespeare studies, but also puts forward a convincing case for Shakespeare 's continuing relevance to contemporary theory.

We know Shakespeare's writings only from imperfectly-made early editions, from which editors struggle to remove errors. The New Bibliography of the early twentieth century, refined with technological enhancements in the 1950s and 1960s, taught generations of editors how to make sense of the early editions of Shakespeare and use them to make modern editions. This book is the first complete history of the ideas that gave this movement its intellectual authority, and of the challenges to that authority that emerged in the 1980s and 1990s. Working chronologically, Egan traces the struggle to wring from the early editions evidence of precisely what Shakespeare wrote. The story of another struggle, between competing interpretations of the evidence from early editions, is told in detail and the consequences for editorial practice are comprehensively surveyed, allowing readers to discover just what is at stake when scholars argue about how to edit Shakespeare.

We know Shakespeare's writings only from imperfectly-made early editions, from which editors struggle to remove errors. The New Bibliography of the early twentieth century, refined with technological enhancements in the 1950s and 1960s, taught generations of editors how to make sense of the early editions of Shakespeare and use them to make modern editions. This book is the first complete history of the ideas that gave this movement its intellectual authority, and of the challenges to that authority that emerged in the 1980s and 1990s. Working chronologically, Egan traces the struggle to wring from the early editions evidence of precisely what Shakespeare wrote. The story of another struggle, between competing interpretations of the evidence from early editions, is told in detail and the consequences for editorial practice are comprehensively surveyed, allowing readers to discover just what is at stake when scholars argue about how to edit Shakespeare.

This guide helps readers make sense of the most commonly taught writer in the world. One approach to Shakespeare is as a dramatist while another approach is to think of him as essentially a poetic writer. The tension between these two views is a theme in this book because it helps us to reflect upon changing literary and critical trends. This is primarily a book for readers of Shakespeare who most commonly experience Shakespeare-on-stage through imagined performances in their own heads.

The book starts with a brief explanation of how Shakespeare's writings have come down to us as a series of scripts for actors in the early modern theatre industry of London. The first half of the book then interrogates Shakespearean genres, while the second half examines different critical approaches to his plays via the four key issues of authorship, performance, identity and materialism. The book returns repeatedly to such questions as: 'what has changed since Shakespeare's time?', 'to what uses has Shakespeare been put?', and 'what value is in Shakespeare?' - questions that go to the heart of why we study Shakespeare.

Key Features

*A chronology of Shakespeare's career as an actor/dramatist that locates him within the theatre industry of his time.

*New readings of twelve plays that form a core of the Shakespeare canon: "A Midsummer Night's Dream," "Much Ado About Nothing," "Richard 2," "Henry 5," "Hamlet," "Othello," "All's Well that Ends Well," "The Winter's Tale," "Macbeth," "Measure for Measure," "The Tempest," and "Timon of Athens,"

*Critical analyses organized by genre (comedies, histories, tragedies, and romance) and by four key critical approaches: authorship, performance, identities, and materialism.

*An extensive resources section, including a glossary of the important critical terms that are often used in debates about Shakespeare.

The New Oxford Shakespeare is a landmark print and online project, which for the first time provides fully edited and annotated texts of all extant versions of all Shakespeare's works, including collaborations, revisions, and adaptations. Based on a fresh examination of the surviving original documents, it draws upon the latest interdisciplinary scholarship, supplemented by new research undertaken by a diverse international team. Although closely connected and systematically cross-referenced, each part can be used independently of the others. The New Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works: Critical Reference Edition collects the same versions of the same works found in the Modern Critical Edition, keyed to the same line-numbering. But the Critical Reference Edition emphasizes book history and the documentary origins of each text. It preserves the spelling, punctuation, capitalization, abbreviations, typographical contrasts, ambiguities, and inconsistencies of the early documents. Introductions focus on early modern manuscript and print culture, setting each text within the material circumstances of its production, transmission, and early reception. The works are arranged in the chronological order of the surviving texts: the first volume covers documents manufactured in Shakespeare's lifetime, and the second covers documents made between 1622 and 1728. The illustrated general introduction presents an overview of the texts available to editors and describes how they define Shakespeare. An essay on error surveys kinds of error characteristic of these early text technologies. It is followed by a general introduction to the music of Shakespeare's plays. Introductions to individual works and an extensive foot-of-the-page textual apparatus record and discuss editorial corrections of scribal and printing errors in the early documents; marginal notes record press variants and key variants in different documents. Original music notation is provided for the songs (where available). Because the plays were written and copied within the framework of theatrical requirements, casting charts identify the length and type of each role, discuss potential doubling possibilities, and note essential props. The New Oxford Shakespeare consists of four interconnected publications: the Modern Critical Edition (with modern spelling), the Critical Reference Edition (with original spelling), a companion volume on Authorship, and an online version integrating all of this material on OUP's high-powered scholarly editions platform. Together, they provide the perfect resource for the future of Shakespeare studies.

Marxist cultural theory underlies much teaching and research in university departments of literature and has played a crucial role in the development of recent theoretical work. Feminism, New Historicism, cultural materialism, postcolonial theory, and queer theory all draw upon ideas about cultural production which can be traced to Marx, and significantly each also has a special relation with Renaissance literary studies. This book explores the past and continuing influence of Marx's ideas in work on Shakespeare. Marx's ideas about cultural production and its relation to economic production are clearly explained, together with the standard terminology and concepts such as base/superstructure, ideology, commodity fetishism, alienation, and reification. The influence of Marx's ideas on the theory and practice of Shakespeare criticism and performance is traced from the Victorian age to the present day. The continuing importance of these ideas is illustrated via new Marxist readings of King Lear, hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, Timon of Athens, The Comedy of Errors, All's Well that Ends Well, and The Winter's Tale.

The Complete Works: Modern Critical Edition is part of the landmark New Oxford Shakespeare-an entirely new consideration of all of Shakespeare's works, edited afresh from all the surviving original versions of his work, and drawing on the latest literary, textual, and theatrical scholarship. In one attractive volume, the Modern Critical Edition gives today's students and playgoers the very best resources they need to understand and enjoy all Shakespeare's works. The authoritative text is accompanied by extensive explanatory and performance notes, and innovative introductory materials which lead the reader into exploring questions about interpretation, textual variants, literary criticism, and performance, for themselves. The Modern Critical Edition presents the plays and poetry in the order in which Shakespeare wrote them, so that readers can follow the development of his imagination, his engagement with a rapidly evolving culture and theatre, and his relationship to his literary contemporaries. The New Oxford Shakespeare consists of four interconnected publications: the Modern Critical Edition (with modern spelling), the Critical Reference Edition (with original spelling), a companion volume on Authorship, and an online version integrating all of this material on OUP's high-powered scholarly editions platform. Together, they provide the perfect resource for the future of Shakespeare studies.

This companion volume to The New Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works concentrates on the issues of canon and chronology-currently the most active and controversial debates in the field of Shakespeare editing. It presents in full the evidence behind the choices made in The Complete Works about which works Shakespeare wrote, in whole or part. A major new contribution to attribution studies, the Authorship Companion illuminates the work and methodology underpinning the groundbreaking New Oxford Shakespeare, and casts new light on the professional working practices, and creative endeavours, of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. We now know that Shakespeare collaborated with his literary and dramatic contemporaries, and that others adapted his works before they reached printed publication. The Authorship Companion's essays explore and explain these processes, laying out everything we currently know about the works' authorship. Using a variety of different attribution methods, The New Oxford Shakespeare has confirmed the presence of other writers' hands in plays that until recently were thought to be Shakespeare's solo work. Taking this process further with meticulous, fresh scholarship, essays in the Authorship Companion show why we must now add new plays to the accepted Shakespeare canon and reattribute certain parts of familiar Shakespeare plays to other writers. The technical arguments for these decisions about Shakespeare's creativity are carefully laid out in language that anyone interested in the topic can understand. The latest methods for authorship attribution are explained in simple but accurate terms and all the linguistic data on which the conclusions are based is provided. The New Oxford Shakespeare consists of four interconnected publications: the Modern Critical Edition (with modern spelling), the Critical Reference Edition (with original spelling), a companion volume on Authorship, and an online version integrating all of this material on OUP's high-powered scholarly editions platform. Together, they provide the perfect resource for the future of Shakespeare studies.

This guide helps readers make sense of the most commonly taught writer in the world. One approach to Shakespeare is as a dramatist while another approach is to think of him as essentially a poetic writer. The tension between these two views is a theme in this book because it helps us to reflect upon changing literary and critical trends. This is primarily a book for readers of Shakespeare who most commonly experience Shakespeare-on-stage through imagined performances in their own heads.

The book starts with a brief explanation of how Shakespeare's writings have come down to us as a series of scripts for actors in the early modern theatre industry of London. The first half of the book then interrogates Shakespearean genres, while the second half examines different critical approaches to his plays via the four key issues of authorship, performance, identity and materialism. The book returns repeatedly to such questions as: 'what has changed since Shakespeare's time?', 'to what uses has Shakespeare been put?', and 'what value is in Shakespeare?' - questions that go to the heart of why we study Shakespeare.

Key Features

*A chronology of Shakespeare's career as an actor/dramatist that locates him within the theatre industry of his time.

*New readings of twelve plays that form a core of the Shakespeare canon: "A Midsummer Night's Dream," "Much Ado About Nothing," "Richard 2," "Henry 5," "Hamlet," "Othello," "All's Well that Ends Well," "The Winter's Tale," "Macbeth," "Measure for Measure," "The Tempest," and "Timon of Athens,"

*Critical analyses organized by genre (comedies, histories, tragedies, and romance) and by four key critical approaches: authorship, performance, identities, and materialism.

*An extensive resources section, including a glossary of the important critical terms that are often used in debates about Shakespeare.