Gillian Woods

Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare's most popular tragedies and has provoked a rich diversity of interpretations. Definitively passionate, it is much more than the archetypal love story: the play tests the limits of tragedy and comedy, challenges gender roles and explores the nature of language. In this Reader's Guide, Gillian Woods: • surveys key critical responses to Romeo and Juliet, from the sixteenth century to the twenty-first century • plots a clear route through the vast array of debates, identifying chronological and thematic connections and explaining contexts • investigates major issues and approaches such as deconstruction, psychoanalytical criticism, feminism and queer theory • discusses film adaptations, including Baz Luhrmann's 1996 box-office hit William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet. Authoritative and accessible, this invaluable Guide provides students, teachers and researchers with a panorama of the play's critical history in all its dynamic variety.

Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet

This guide surveys the truly essential criticism of the play over the last four centuries, from 16th-century responses to the present day. Discussing key areas of debate, and a wide range of scholarship, Gillian Woods provides an invaluable introduction to the vast array of criticism surrounding one of Shakespeare's most popular plays.

Sarah Dustagheer

What do 'stage directions' do in early modern drama? Who or what are they directing: action on the stage, or imagination via the page? Is the label 'stage direction' helpful or misleading? Do these 'directions' provide evidence of Renaissance playhouse practice? What happens when we put them at the centre of literary close readings of early modern plays? Stage Directions and Shakespearean Theatre investigates these problems through innovative research by a range of international experts. This collection of essays examines the creative possibilities of stage directions and and their implications for actors and audiences, readers and editors, historians and contemporary critics. Looking at the different ways stage directions make meaning, this volume provides new insights into a range of Renaissance plays.

Gillian Woods

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