This volume is intended as a companion and guide to reading Shakespeare’s plays and to experiencing them where they belong, in the theatre. The previous version of this work, published as Shakespeare: An Illustrated Dictionary (1978, 2nd edn. 1986), has undergone a thorough revision, and there are many new entries resulting from advances in Shakespeare scholarship and from the constantly changing treatment of the plays in the theatre. Each play has a separate entry giving the basic information about its date, sources, and first publication, followed by a selective account of the history of its theatrical presentation. Other entries are concerned with Shakespeare’s life, his contemporaries, his interpreters, creative artists who have come under his influence, and other topics likely to interest those who enjoy Shakespeare’s works, and who want to know more about him and them. Selectivity has been essential. It would have been possible, for example, to fill the volume with entries for Shakespeare’s theatrical interpreters alone. We have tried to choose the great figures of the past along with those who are most active as Shakespeare performers at present. The section on Further Reading at the end of the book points to additional sources of information. An asterisk indicates that there is a separate entry in the dictionary for the topic so marked. The volume also includes a finding list of the characters in Shakespeare’s plays, a conjectural chronology, and a statistical appendix providing interesting facts about Shakespeare’s work.
Normally, quotations from early printed books and documents are given in modern form. Quotations from Shakespeare are from the Oxford Complete Works, General Editors Stanley Wells and Gary Taylor (1986, etc.). In compiling the many facts for this book, the library staffs of the Shakespeare Institute and Shakespeare Centre, Stratford-upon-Avon, have been a constant help, and we would like to thank Christine Buckley for her scrupulous copy-editing.
S.W.W.
J.S.