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Shakespeare's Major Plays Volume 1
Cheryl Taylor, James Cook University
Copyright Year:
ISBN 13: 9780645951622
Publisher: James Cook University
Language: English
Formats Available
Conditions of Use
Attribution-NonCommercial
CC BY-NC
Reviews
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As an introductory book for three of Shakespeare's plays (Hamlet, As You Like It, and Romeo and Juliet), this textbook provides full texts of each play and supplemental material. However, with all of the resources available on these plays, there's... read more
As an introductory book for three of Shakespeare's plays (Hamlet, As You Like It, and Romeo and Juliet), this textbook provides full texts of each play and supplemental material. However, with all of the resources available on these plays, there's room for additional material. It is excellent for providing a cohesive introduction to Shakespeare using three plays.
The editions all come from the Folger and are accurate. The supplemental material is all based around the author's teaching/course materials, so it has consistency throughout. I'm not sure there's a way to be free from biases about Shakespeare, but this author clearly makes the effort to challenge students to think about various ways of reading Shakespeare today and also what his work would have meant to his contemporaries.
I really like the way this author has integrated recent materials, up through at least 2022, if not even more recent. The discussion questions and supplemental material should be useful for many years to come.
Everything is clearly written and jargon-free.
The supplemental materials for each of the three plays are clearly from the same author, which gives the book consistency throughout. I think the "Attitudes and Issues" section was the most important for teachers and students to look into. The one on 'As You Like It' was especially in-depth.
Some of the materials blurred together and could have used stronger headings/design. I was able to scroll through easily to find different sections, but there was not preview of the sub-sections beyond the four major divisions of each "chapter."
There was consistent organization between chapters.
I had no trouble navigating through the links, videos, etc. Also, the images were clear and well-documented.
There were no errors in grammar.
This text was not culturally insensitive. A lot of the critical focus centered around gender. Of course, there's a lot of new research and discussion around race and Shakespeare that was not brought into this book. However, the three plays for this volume aren't typically at the center of discussions around race and Shakespeare, though I would have liked to see a little more critical work in the introduction to help students realize that this was/is an issue that can and should be brought up with any play, especially since race is a factor in so many performances. I'd be curious to see additional volumes to know if this will be something that will be addressed.
If I was trying to plan an introductory Shakespeare course, and I wanted to see a good model of how to put a group of plays together for a class, this would be a helpful place to start. I like the consistency in the approach across all three plays. As a college teacher, I was most interested in the discussion questions, so I went straight for the "Attitudes and Issues" sections of each chapter. These were very good! There are other places outside of this book that you can go for historical context and performance history, but for classroom discussion guidance, this book will be helpful. The links to the Folger editions all worked fine and will help students easily stay on the same page if they are reading together. I'd definitely give this book a read through if you are thinking of teaching any of these plays or if you want a model of how to group plays together under similar themes.
Table of Contents
- Front Matter
- Introduction: Beyond the Bard
- Part I. As You Like It: Shakespeare's 'Drama of Happiness'
- Part II. Romeo and Juliet: 'The Greatest Love Story Ever Told'
- Part III. Hamlet: 'A Murder Most Foul, Strange and Unnatural'
- Postscript
- Appendix: Hamlet Resources
- Works Cited
- Versioning History
Ancillary Material
Submit ancillary resourceAbout the Book
This book is designed to assist upper secondary school and first and second-year university students in their reading and understanding of Shakespeare's plays. The plays selected for discussion are those that students are most likely to encounter in their early adventures with Shakespeare. Each discussion provides guidance on issues raised by each play and suggests approaches from which students can build original ideas and insights. The book contains interactive exercises that are designed to assist students to understand and remember the characters, plots and structures of Shakespeare's plays. The book contains free full text copies of the plays. Volume 1 includes As You Like It, Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet.
About the Contributors
Author
Before retiring in 2006, Cheryl Taylor lectured in English and other literatures at James Cook University in Townsville. From 2008 to 2016 she lectured as an adjunct research fellow in the School of Humanities at Griffith University. She is a co-founder of the AustLit subset, Writing the Tropical North, and a recipient of the University of Queensland’s Fryer Library Award. In 2019 she and her husband, Norman, returned to Townsville to be near their son, Mike. She has edited books and published articles on Middle English, Medieval Latin and Australian literature. In 2017 she edited Thea Astley: Selected Poems for University of Queensland Press. Cheryl is currently an Adjunct Associate Professor in the Centre for Arts, Society and Education at James Cook University, and a Reviews Editor for JASAL (Journal for the Study of Australian Literature).