The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare's History Plays

Description

Shakespeare's history plays have been performed more in recent years than ever before, in Britain, North America, and in Europe. This volume provides an accessible, wide-ranging and informed introduction to Shakespeare's history and Roman plays. It is attentive throughout to the plays as they have been performed over the centuries since they were written. The first part offers accounts of the genre of the history play, of Renaissance historiography, of pageants and masques, and of women's roles, as well as comparisons with history plays in Spain and the Netherlands. Chapters in the second part look at individual plays as well as other Shakespearean texts which are closely related to the histories. The Companion offers a full bibliography, genealogical tables, and a list of principal and recurrent characters. It is a comprehensive guide for students, researchers and theatre-goers alike.

Michael Hattaway was educated in New Zealand and at Cambridge. He has taught at the Universities of Kent, British Columbia, Massachusetts, and Sheffield. He is the author of Elizabethan Popular Theatre (1982) and Hamlet:The Critics Debate (1987) and is the editor of A Companion to English Renaissance Literature and Culture (2000); with A. R. Braunmuller, of The Cambridge Companion to English Renaissance Drama (1990), and, with Derek Roper and Boika Sokolova, of Shakespeare in the New Europe (1994). For the New Mermaids he has edited Beaumont's The Knight of the Burning Pestle, for the New Cambridge Shakespeare 1-3 Henry VI and As You Like It, and for the Revels Series Jonson's The New Inn.

'Its compendiousness and the high quality of essays dealing with virtually every aspect of Shakespeare and history make it relevant to anyone anywhere interested in Shakespeare's history plays.' Around the Globe