Midsummer Night's Dream (Rsc Shakespeare) [Paperback]

W Shakespeare (Author)

Book Description

Series: Rsc Shakespeare

From the Royal Shakespeare Company -- a fresh new edition of Shakespeare's most loved comedy. This book includes: * An introduction to A Midsummer Night's Dream by award-winning scholar Jonathan Bate * The play -- with clear explanatory notes on each page * A scene-by-scene analysis * An introduction to Shakespeare's career and the Elizabethan theatre * A rich exploration of approaches to staging the play The most enjoyable way to understand a Shakespeare play is to see it or participate in it. This book presents a historical overview of A Midsummer Night's Dream in performance, recommends film versions, takes a detailed look at specific productions and includes interviews with three leading Directors -- Michael Boyd, Gregory Doran and Tim Supple -- so that we may get a sense of the extraordinary variety of interpretations that are possible - a variety that gives Shakespeare his unique capacity to be reinvented and made 'our contemporary' four centuries after his death. www.rscshakespeare.co.uk

Editorial Reviews

Review

'Jonathan Bate writes with as much elegance as insight about the making of theatre and the creation of the plays.' -Richard Eyre, The Sunday Telegraph 'Footnotes at the bottom of each page gloss unfamiliar vocabulary, paraphrase tricky meanings and uncover bawdy puns. There is a universe to be found in these annotations: the Renaissance world of power and fate, sex and death, language and philosophy.' - Times Educational Supplement

About the Author

JONATHAN BATE is Professor of Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature, University of Warwick, UK, and the editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He has held visiting posts at Harvard, Yale and UCLA and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Fellow of the British Academy, an Honorary Fellow of St Catherine's College, Cambridge, and a Governor and Board member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. A prominent critic, award-winning biographer and broadcaster, he is the author of several books on Shakespeare, including The Genius of Shakespeare (Picador), which was praised by Sir Peter Hall, founder of the RSC, as "the best modern book on Shakespeare." In June 2006 he was awarded a CBE by HM The Queen 'for services to Higher Education'. ERIC RASMUSSEN is Professor of English at the University of Nevada, USA, and the Textual Editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He is co-editor of the Norton Anthology of English Renaissance Drama and has edited volumes in both the Arden Shakespeare and Oxford World's Classics series. He is the General Textual Editor of the Internet Shakespeare Editions project - one of the most visited Shakespeare websites in the world. For over nine years he has written the annual review of editions and textual studies for the Shakespeare Survey.

Product Details

• Paperback: 184 pages
• Publisher: Palgrave (September 5, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0230217893
• ISBN-13: 978-0230217898
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,329,502 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #51 in Books > Children's Books > Literature & Fiction > Historical Fiction > Renaissance

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A light and enjoyable introduction to Shakespear, April 27, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare Made Easy) (Paperback)

As a new Shakespeare reader, I can not compare it with his other plays, but I can say that A mid Summer night's dream is a light and enjoyable play. The characters are interesting, the setting is wonderful and the telling of the story is very visual. The aspect of the fairy world was particularly nice as well as the every so often witty lines. By using Shakespeare made easy, I was able to "translate" Shakespeare's language into plain English. By doing so I was able to better understand and get more of a feel of the play on the long run. I will use the "made easy" books again in my further Shakespeare readings I enjoyed them very much.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Shakespeare made easy, January 30, 2010

By 

J. T. Conn (DC area) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare Made Easy) (Paperback)

The title says it all. This book makes the daunting task of reading Shakespeare less so. High schoolers can read the original plays side by side with modern translations. A truly great book to make enjoying Shakespeare a reality.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A light and enjoyable introduction to Shakespear, April 27, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare Made Easy) (Paperback)

As a new Shakespeare reader, I can not compare it with his other plays, but I can say that A mid Summer night's dream is a light and enjoyable play. The characters are interesting, the setting is wonderful and the telling of the story is very visual. The aspect of the fairy world was particularly nice as well as the every so often witty lines. By using Shakespeare made easy, I was able to "translate" Shakespeare's language into plain English. By doing so I was able to better understand and get more of a feel of the play on the long run. I will use the "made easy" books again in my further Shakespeare readings I enjoyed them very much.