1st Edition

Comic Transformations in Shakespeare

By Ruth Nevo Copyright 1980
    256 Pages
    by Routledge

    250 Pages
    by Routledge

    First published in 1980.

    In this study of Shakespeare's ten early comedies, from The Comedy of Errors to Twelfth Night, the concept of a dynamic of comic form is developed; the Falstaff plays are seen as a watershed, and the emergence of new comic protagonists - the resourceful, anti-romantic romantic heroine and the Fool - as the summit of the achievement.

    The plays are explored from three complementary perspectives - theoretical, developmental and interpretative which lead to a further understanding of the powerful relation between the plays' formal complexity and their naturalistic verisimilitude.

    1. Shakespeare's New Comedy 2. 'My glass and not my brother' 3. 'Kate of Kate Hall' 4. The Two Gentlemen of Verona 5. Navarre's world of words 6. Fancy's images 7. Jessica's monkey; or, The Goodwins 8. The case of Falstaff and the Merry Wives 9. 'Better than reportingly' 10. Existence in Arden 11. Nature's bias 12. Comic remedies 13. Appendix: Scanning a Shakespeare play

    Biography

    Ruth Nevo

    'Professor Nevo does three things at once: she analyses Shakespeare's early comedies, she interprets them in the light of a theory of comedy, and she traces Shakespeare's development as a comic dramatist. She not only achieves these aims with superb confidence, but she successfully integrates her different concerns in a chapter-by-chapter discussion of the plays.' English Studies.