Synopsis:

The Oxford Shakespeare offers authoritative texts from leading scholars in editions designed to interpret and illuminate the plays for modern readers. Contains:

* a new, modern-spelling text, based on the 1623 First Folio
* detailed introduction considers composition, sources, historical events, performances and changing critical attitudes to the play
* on-page commentary and notes explain meaning, staging, identify historical figures and events, and much else
* appendices include extracts from the chronicle sources and new research on the use of boy actors in Elizabethan performance
* illustrated with production photographs and related art
* full index to introduction and commentary

'Not simply a better text but a new conception of Shakespeare. This is a major achievement of twentieth-century scholarship.' – Times Literary Supplement