Simply Shakespeare

by Toby Widdicombe

Simply Shakespeare actively engages students in understanding and appreciating Shakespeare's language and intricate stagecraft. Written in a straightforward, engaging style, the text avoids the “dumbing-down,” popular-culture approach to Shakespeare as well as the elevated academic style written for other academics rather than students. Rather, Simply Shakespeare emphasizes how to read and watch Shakespeare for comprehension and enjoyment. An organization and layout that uses “test cases,” boxed material, bulleted lists, illustrations, chapter overviews, end-of-chapter assignments, background material, glossary, web resources, and more makes the text especially accessible for students.

Genres: Shakespeare, Nonfiction

238 pages, Paperback

First published July 7, 2001

Reviews

[Moses · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good introduction to Shakespeare's drama and comedy. Widdicombe is very concerned with making you like the Bard as much as he does--I was already on board, but I appreciate the effort. There is some great stuff about why Shakespeare does what he does.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some really top-rate explanations, stimulating thoughts, mixed with some irritating 20th century rot. This book really helped me to get Shakespeare's greatness in a lot of ways, even if he had his axes to grind from time to time.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really liked this one. Good intro to Shakespeare along with helpful breakdown of the figures of speech that he used.