Shakespeare's Sonnets (Arden Shakespeare.Third Series) (The Arden Shakespeare) - Softcover

William Shakespeare

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1903436575 ISBN 13: 9781903436578

Publisher: The Arden Shakespeare, 1997

Synopsis

'The annotation is consistently thoughtful and well judged, giving plenty of precise help with lexical and syntactical problems, and offering valuable verbal and cultural analogues from contemporary literature'No edition of these difficult and controversial poems will command agreement at all points, but this must now be the edition of first resort'Paul Hammond, Review of English Studies'sharpens our focus on the documentary record of the Sonnets, and gives the best scholarly account yet of some of its words.'Alastair Fowler, Times Literary Supplement"The new edition...edited by Katherine Duncan Jones, is the clearest, most complete and up-to-date there is. She is the first editor for general readers not to mumble when dealing with the homoerotic aspect. Under her meticulous direction, the sequence opens out like a magical garden, its beauties enhanced, its mysterious prospects illuminated."Duncan Fallowell, The Independent'It is Duncan Jones's intention as scholar and critic to confront the issue of sexuality which Kerrigan and other editors have consistently side-stepped...Hers is an edition which uniquely makes the Sonnets issue from the body's moods as well as the mind's.' Tom Paulin, London Review of Books'This new edition, handsome, crisp in annotation, and rich in historical detail, shows that the Sonnets are effectively Shakespeare's life's work...Its most radical claim is not the familiar one that the poems are homosexual, but that Shakespeare authorised their publication.'Evening Standard

About this title

Synopsis:

This Arden edition of Shakespeare's sonnets is closely based on the 1609 Quarto. As Katherine Duncan-Jones demonstrates, this text was authorized by Shakespeare himself, and may be based on an authorial manuscript. The whole carefully-ordered sequence, including "A Lover's Complaint", is read in the context of Shakespeare's career and of the poems' historical setting within early Jacobean culture. A clear-eyed analysis of homoerotic elements in the sonnets puts an end to the century of homophobic readings initiated by Sir Sidney Lee in 1897. Succinct and accessible notes guide the reader through complex vocabulary and syntax, as well as the poems' literary and cultural background. For ease of reference, these are printed on the same page-opening as the text.

About this edition

• Publisher: The Arden Shakespeare
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 1903436575
• ISBN 13: 9781903436578
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 504
• Editor: Katherine Duncan-Jones