Paul Werstine Book order (chronological)

Part of "The New Penguin Shakespeare" series, this text looks at "King Richard III" with an introduction, a list of further reading, commentary and a short account of the textual problems of the play. The series is used and recommended by the Royal Shakespeare Company.

This updated edition includes: *Newly re-edited play text and revised commentary notes *Scene-by-scene plot summaries *A key to the play's famous lines and phrases *An introduction to reading Shakespeare's language *An essay by a leading Shakespeare scholar providing a modern perspective on the play *Fresh images from the Folger Shakespeare Library's vast holdings of rare books *An up-to-date annotated guide to further reading

The Taming of the Shrew is one of the most famous and controversial of Shakespeare's comedies.

An international team of scholars offers: • modernised, easily accessible texts • ample but unobtrusive academic guidance • attention to the theatrical qualities of each play and its stage history • informative illustrations, including reconstructions of early performances Much Ado has always been popular on the stage. This edition pays special attention to the history and range of theatrical interpretation. The most famous actors, from the time of Garrick to the present, have appeared as the sparring lovers Beatrice and Benedick. In recent times the play's matched plots of two pairs of lovers have been of interest to feminist critics. A full commentary includes annotation of the many sexual jokes in the play that have been obscured by the complexity of Elizabethan language.

This second edition of Othello has a new, illustrated introduction by leading American scholar Ayanna Thompson, which addresses such key issues as race, religion and gender, as well as looking at ways in which the play has been adapted in more recent times. Othello is one of Shakespeare's great tragedies-written in the same five-year period as Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth. The new introduction attends to the play's different meanings throughout history, while articulating the historical context in which Othello was created, paying particular attention to Shakespeare's source materials and the evidence about early modern constructions of racial and religious difference. It also explores the life of the play in different historical moments, demonstrating how meanings and performances develop, accrue, and metamorphose over time. The volume provides a rich and current resource, making this best-selling play edition ideal for today's students at advanced school and undergraduate level.

In The Merchant of Venice, the penniless but attractive Bassanio seeks, and finally wins, the hand of the fabulously wealthy Portia. But even as the play provokes laughter, it also provokes something disturbing, as Bassanio's courtship is actually financed by the magnificent villain Shylock the moneylender -- the focus of anti-Semitic sentiment, and one of the most controversial yet strangely sympathetic of Shakespeare's characters, whose actions and whose treatment in the play are still debated to this day.This simplified retelling of the Shakespearean comedy also includes activities related to the text.