Three Comedies : The taming of the shrew ; A midsummer night's dream ; Twelfth night

by William Shakespeare

The authoritative edition of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Taming of the Shrew, and Twelfth Night from The Folger Shakespeare Library, the trusted and widely used Shakespeare series for students and general readers.

The havoc wrought on lovers by magic in A Midsummer Night’s Dream , the furious battle of the sexes waged in The Taming of the Shrew , and a stranded woman finding her way in a man’s world in Twelfth Night —this collection of three of Shakespeare’s greatest comedies is based on the acclaimed individual Folger editions of the plays.

This edition
-Freshly edited text based on the best early printed version of the play
-Full explanatory notes
-Scene-by-scene plot summaries

The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, is home to the world’s largest collection of Shakespeare’s printed works, and a magnet for Shakespeare scholars from around the globe. In addition to exhibitions open to the public throughout the year, the Folger offers a full calendar of performances and programs. For more information, visit Folger.edu.

Genres: Plays

448 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1929

About the author

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Shakespeare remains arguably the most influential writer in the English language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.
Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner ("sharer") of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men after the ascension of King James VI and I of Scotland to the English throne. At age 49 (around 1613), he appears to have retired to Stratford, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive; this has stimulated considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, his sexuality, his religious beliefs, and even certain fringe theories as to whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
Shakespeare produced most of his known works between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories and are regarded as some of the best works produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until 1608, among them Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth, all considered to be among the finest works in the English language. In the last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also known as romances) and collaborated with other playwrights.
Many of Shakespeare's plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. However, in 1623, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare's, published a more definitive text known as the First Folio, a posthumous collected edition of Shakespeare's dramatic works that includes 36 of his plays. Its Preface was a prescient poem by Ben Jonson, a former rival of Shakespeare, that hailed Shakespeare with the now famous epithet: "not of an age, but for all time".

Reviews

[Jessica Scullino · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Journey of Wit, Wordplay, and Dual Perspectives

Diving into Shakespeare’s comedies at a university level completely redefined how I view his lighter works.

Having first read The Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night's Dream in high school, returning to them alongside Twelfth Night with an academic lens was an incredible experience. On the page, these plays transform from simple, chaotic farces into rapid-fire prose, sharp psychological metaphors, and complex social commentary.

1. The Taming of the Shrew: From Slapstick to Linguistic Combat

Reading this in high school, the focus is often on the physical comedy and the eccentric plot. But revisiting it in university highlights an absolute fireworks display of rapid-fire prose and stichomythia (fast, alternating lines of dialogue). The verbal sparring between Petruchio and Katherine is a linguistic chess match where every insult is a pun and every retort is a weapon. The text reveals an underlying battle of equal wits that is fascinating to unpack on the page.

2. A Midsummer Night's Dream: Unpacking the Darker Woods

In high school, Midsummer feels like a bright, whimsical fairy tale. Returning to it later reveals a much more brilliant, subversive exploration of human irrationality. The structural contrast between the strict, orderly prose of courtly Athens and the lawless, poetic verse of the moonlit woods is incredible. The forest acts as a massive psychological metaphor, a space of shifting desires, loss of control, and animalistic transformation that exposes how fragile human reason truly is.

3. Twelfth Night: The Elegance of the Mask

Rounding out my study of the comedies, Twelfth Night stands as a masterwork of dramatic irony, focusing heavily on the prose of melancholy and the symbolism of disguise. Viola’s transformation into the page boy Cesario serves as a brilliant metaphor for the fluid nature of identity and social roles. It weaves a bittersweet tapestry where the characters are completely blind to the truth, leaving the reader to marvel at how beautifully Shakespeare orchestrates the chaos.

Moving from a high school introduction to a university-level analysis of these texts proved that Shakespeare's comedies are just as deeply layered, linguistically sharp, and structurally brilliant as his greatest tragedies. They remain some of my absolute favorite pieces.