A Midsummer Night's Dream (Sourcebooks Shakespeare; Book & CD) [Paperback]

William Shakespeare (Author), Dominique Raccah (Series Editor) (Editor), Marie Macaisa (Series Editor) (Editor), Terri Borus (Text Editor) (Editor), David Bevington (Advisor) (Contributor), Peter Holland (Advisor) (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 27, 2006

More than 60 minutes of audio on the CD including key scenes and excerpts from great performances past and present

Bringing Shakespeare to life, from stage to page

In the book:
Photographs from notable productions including:
-the 1935 Dieterle/Reinhardt film with James Cagney as Bottom and Mickey Rooney as Puck
-Peter Brook's seminal 1970 production at the Royal Shakespeare Company
-contemporary American productions with James Earl Jones as Oberon, F. Murray Abraham as Bottom and Richard Gere as Demetrius

Hear 30 great scenes on audio CD:
-Sir John Gielgud from the 1930s
-Michael Maloney as Oberon and Roy Hudd as Bottom
-Andrew Wade on Speaking Shakespeare

Narrated by Derek Jacobi

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Peter Holland is the McMeel Family Chair in Shakespeare Studies at the University of Notre Dame. One of the central figures in performance-oriented Shakespeare criticism, he has also edited many Shakespeare plays, including A Midsummer Night's Dream for the Oxford Shakespeare series.

David Bevington is the Phyllis Fay Horton Distinguished Service Professor in the Humanities at the University of Chicago. A renowned text scholar, he has edited several Shakespeare editions including the Bantam Shakespeare in individual paperback volumes, The Complete Works of Shakespeare, (Longman, 2003), and Troilus and Cressida (Arden, 1998). He teaches courses in Shakespeare, Renaissance Drama, and Medieval Drama.

Dominique Raccah is founder, president, and publisher of Sourcebooks, a leading independent publisher outside of Chicago. Today Sourcebooks publishes nonfiction, fiction, and poetry. She is the series editor of Poetry Speaks and the Sourcebooks Shakespeare.

Marie Macaisa is a student and long-time fan of Shakespeare's works, leaving her previous career in high-tech to become the series editor of the Sourcebooks Shakespeare. She contributes the Cast Speaks essays for all volumes, writes the script and produces the accompanying audio, and is at work the upcoming titles in the series.

Terri Bourus is an Assistant Professor of English at Indiana University Kokomo where she teaches Shakespeare and Renaissance Drama. She received her Ph.D. in 2000 from Northern Illinois University and her numerous publications include "Working as a Director: An Interview with Aaron Posner," Shakespeare Bulletin (2003), "The First Quarto of Hamlet in Film: The Revenge-Tragedies of Nicol Williamson and Mel Gibson," in EnterText (2001), Shakespeare's 'Hamlet': Complete Study Edition. Ed. Sidney Lamb (2000) and the upcoming text, "Enter Hamlet [Reading on a book]": Shakespeare's Other Audience and the Publication of the Hamlet Quartos" in Shakespeare's Book, ed. Richard Wilson (2006).

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Sourcebooks MediaFusion; Edition Unstated edition (April 27, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1402206895
• ISBN-13: 978-1402206894
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 6.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #975,731 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in April 1564, and his birth is traditionally celebrated on April 23. The facts of his life, known from surviving documents, are sparse. He was one of eight children born to John Shakespeare, a merchant of some standing in his community. William probably went to the King's New School in Stratford, but he had no university education. In November 1582, at the age of eighteen, he married Anne Hathaway, eight years his senior, who was pregnant with their first child, Susanna. She was born on May 26, 1583. Twins, a boy, Hamnet ( who would die at age eleven), and a girl, Judith, were born in 1585. By 1592 Shakespeare had gone to London working as an actor and already known as a playwright. A rival dramatist, Robert Greene, referred to him as "an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers." Shakespeare became a principal shareholder and playwright of the successful acting troupe, the Lord Chamberlain's Men (later under James I, called the King's Men). In 1599 the Lord Chamberlain's Men built and occupied the Globe Theater in Southwark near the Thames River. Here many of Shakespeare's plays were performed by the most famous actors of his time, including Richard Burbage, Will Kempe, and Robert Armin. In addition to his 37 plays, Shakespeare had a hand in others, including Sir Thomas More and The Two Noble Kinsmen, and he wrote poems, including Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. His 154 sonnets were published, probably without his authorization, in 1609. In 1611 or 1612 he gave up his lodgings in London and devoted more and more time to retirement in Stratford, though he continued writing such plays as The Tempest and Henry VII until about 1613. He died on April 23 1616, and was buried in Holy Trinity Church, Stratford. No collected edition of his plays was published during his life-time, but in 1623 two members of his acting company, John Heminges and Henry Condell, put together the great collection now called the First Folio.