Five Great Comedies: Much Ado About Nothing, Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night's Dream, As You Like It and The Merry Wives of Windsor

by William Shakespeare

Merriment abounds in these beloved comedies by the Bard, in forms that range from magical mischief to rollicking farce. Five of Shakespeare's most popular comedies appear here, in one convenient and economical volume. Contents include:
Much Ado About Nothing, in which a betrothed couple set a lover's trap for a confirmed bachelor and his sharp-tongued sparring partner
Twelfth Night; or What You Will, the tale of a shipwrecked maiden who disguises herself as a boy and assists a duke in wooing a recalcitrant sweetheart
A Midsummer Night's Dream, in which the fairies of an enchanted forest employ a love potion to sport with four young lovers
As You Like It, concerning the retreat of banished royalty to a greenwood, where the constraints of everyday life are loosened and the characters free to reinvent themselves
The Merry Wives of Windsor, starring the jolly old rogue Sir John Falstaff in a madcap romp that gives his greed and vanity a humorous comeuppance.
--back cover

Genres: Classics, Shakespeare, Plays

388 pages, Mass Market Paperback

Published January 1, 2005

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

[Gary Van Horn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Whew. I am definitely not the target audience for directly reading Shakespeare. I was thinking I would also read Hamlet and Macbeth at some time in the future, but I think I'll do what most college kids do and look at the cliff notes when it comes to Shakespeare from now on.

[Live2learn1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shakespeare's comedies are genious work. It is also a good thing to learn to read plays as well as novels and resource books and other types of literature. Many of the commonplace phrases we use come straight from Shakespeare and it is fun to stumble across them in his plays. Some of his political plays or tragedies have topic material that is not so good for younger readers, but the comedies are full of silly errors and mistaken identities and it is fun to see how mixed up things can get sometimes from a simple turn of events. In The Merry Wives of Windsor, the laughs come from tricks that two wives play on an arrogant, blustery man when he thinks that he is attractive enough to convince two rich women to leave their husbands for him. The big difference in Shakespeare's tragedies and comedies is the endings. In the tragedies, almost everyone is dead at the end; in the comedies almost everyone is married or dancing by the end.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Shakespeare's Comedies, even though they really only revolve around mistaken identity/misunderstandings, twins separated at birth, or magic. If you aren't familiar with As You Like It, it's a very sweet one. It's where the phrase "All the world's a stage" comes from.

[Suzanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

went to the minnesota chamber orchestra performance of this and it was fantastic. I went home and read the book which i wish I would have read before I attended this last minute performance. Love shakespeare

[Tiffany · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great collection of Shakespeare's best comedies: As You Like It, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, and The Tempest.

[The Cute Little Brown-haired girl · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was in the play Merry Wives in Ashland when I was eleven so I have a great affection for Shakespeare. Being able to recite sonnets by heart at age 8 made me quite a strange child indeed!

[Emily AndersMillKnits · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much Ado About Nothing is by far my favorite, in fact I am planning on naming my first daughter Beatrice in hopes that she will have just as witty a tongue as the Shaskepearean counterpart.:)

[Evalyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

My absolute favorite comedy of Shakespeare's.

[lita]

hasil hunting di PBJ, cuma 5000 perak :D

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well. I read two stories out of this book but am familiar with the others. I really like comedies so this book was pretty good, but these stories don't really apeal to mwa

[Ɠяαcє O'Ɓяιєη➵ · Rating 4 out of 5]

A midsummer's night dream was a very interesting story with lots of love and drama.