"He was not of an age, but for all time." So wrote Ben Jonson in his dedicatory verses to the memory of William Shakespeare in 1623, and so we continue to affirm today. No other writer, in English or in any other language, can rival the appeal that Shake...

"He was not of an age, but for all time." So wrote Ben Jonson in his dedicatory verses to the memory of William Shakespeare in 1623, and so we continue to affirm today. No other writer, in English or in any other language, can rival the appeal that Shake...

William Shakespeare's reputation is based primarily on his plays. With the partial exception of the Sonnets (1609), quarried since the early nineteenth century for autobiographical secrets allegedly encoded in them, the nondramatic writings have traditio...

King John New Interpretations S. D. Church (ed.) The Boydell Press xxvi + 361 pp 45 [pounds sterling] ISBN 0-85115-736-X ONE OF THE MOST FAR-REACHING CHANGES in medieval historiography over the last generation has been the rethinking of the relationship of kings...

Lawrence Danson, among others, has demonstrated that certain rhetorical tropes as Elizabethans understood them characterize and order some Shakespeare plays. The action of Coriolanus, for example, amounts to a kinetic combination of two tropes--metonymy and synecdoche (142-62). To these tropes might be added...

Brad Miller scored a season-high 19 points and the Kings snapped a five-game losing steak with a 117-92 win over the Atlanta Hawks on Sunday night.Ahead 53-40 at the half, Sacramento had its highest scoring quarter of the season, outscoring the Hawks 39-22 in the...

A 710-year-old copy of the declaration of human rights known as the Magna Carta — the version that became part of English law — was auctioned for $21.3 million, a Sotheby's spokeswoman said.The document, which had been expected to draw bids of $30 million or...

In the following excerpt, Pugliatti reexamines King John in light of Elizabethan politics, arguing that Shakespeare intended it as a commentary on the political crisis in England.

In the following essay, Elliot argues that Shakespeare's King John reveals the playwright's understanding of the Elizabethans ambiguous and complex interpretations of King John. Elliot shows that while the play's original audiences most likely would have sympathized with John as a nationalist and as a Protestant martyr, Shakespeare's John is also depicted as a usurper and potential murderer.

In the following essay, Dusinberre focuses on the subversive and dramatically energizing qualities of the feminine roles in King John.