Much Ado about Nothing (The New Cambridge Shakespeare) - Softcover

Shakespeare, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521293677 ISBN 13: 9780521293679

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1988

Synopsis

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.

About this title

Review:

Like Love's Labour's Lost, Much Ado about Nothing shows Shakespeare moving into a more complex and darker terrain through his exploration of an apparently harmless comical romance. The play revolves around the adventures of the two gallants Claudio and Benedick at the court of Sicily. Claudio falls in love with the governor's daughter Hero, and is eager for his more misanthropic friend Benedick to also find love. Benedick is introduced to the fiery, independent Beatrice, and sparks soon fly as they banter with each other in a more wittier version of Kate and Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew. Beatrice has some wonderful ripostes to marriage asking why should a woman marry "a clod of wayward marl", whilst Benedick grumbles that "She speaks poniards and every word stabs". Meanwhile, the jealous Don John convinces Claudio that Hero has in fact been unfaithful to him. When Claudio rejects Hero on their wedding day, she faints and is taken for dead. In the hectic final scenes the play moves towards reconciliation between Claudio and Hero, and the tentative admission of the love between Benedick and Beatrice. Famously filmed by Kenneth Branagh in the Tuscan countryside with a cast that included Keanu Reeves, Much Ado about Nothing remains one of Shakespeare's most successful comedies. --Jerry Brotton.

Review:

"Claire McEachern's revised edition of Much Ado About Nothing updates the original introductory material with incisive discussions of gender dynamics, formal and structural characteristics, and stage history." - Studies in English Literature 1500-1900

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1988
• ISBN 10: 0521293677
• ISBN 13: 9780521293679
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 176
• Editor: Mares F. H.