By Alan C. Dessen (NHC Fellow, 2000–01) Alan Dessen focuses on the playtexts used for staging Shakespeare's plays, from almost three hundred productions of the last twenty five years. Dessen examines the process of rescripting–when directors make cuts to streamline the playscript, save running time, etc., and rewriting–when more extensive changes are made. He assesses … Continued
By Charles Segal (NHC Fellow, 1993–94) Much has been written about the heroic figures of Sophocles’ powerful dramas. Now Charles Segal focuses our attention not on individual heroes and heroines, but on the world that inspired and motivated their actions—a universe of family, city, nature, and the supernatural. He shows how these ancient masterpieces offer insight into … Continued
By Stephen Spector (NHC Fellow, 1985–86)
Edited by Stephen Spector (NHC Fellow, 1985–86) The N-Town Cycle is one of the four extant Middle English cycles of mystery plays. A collection of unknown origin, N-Town is composite and in many ways unique. Its forty-one plays, dramatizing divine history from Creation to Doomsday, illustrate ways of reading, supplementing, and altering biblical accounts. The … Continued
Edited by Howard Erskine-Hill (NHC Fellow, 1988–89) and Alexander Lindsay The Critical Heritage gathers together a large body of critical sources on major figures in literature. Each volume presents contemporary responses to a writer's work, enabling student and researcher to read the material themselves.