Anchor Books Shakespeare After All

Definitely the best introduction and companion to all of shakespeare's plays. Garner shows both her deep knowledge and love of Shakespeare and draws you into his world. She is such a good writer herself that 806 pages seem insufficient, leaving you to want more from her!A joy to read! Indispensable!

I read this book and watched a series of videos on YouTube by Marjorie Garber at the same time. A real joy as I learnt so much.

Il pacco è arrivato intatto, tempi di consegna rispettati. Il testo contiene l'analisi di tutte le opere teatrali di Shakespeare (come già il testo meno recente di Harold Bloom, The Invention of the Human). Lo consiglio vivamente, perché ogni analisi contiene riflessioni e spunti interessanti e la bibliografia alla fine del libro è molto ricca. Io sto usando questo testo per la mia tesi di laurea magistrale e so che spesso viene adottato come testo di riferimento anche da alcuni docenti universitari.

As a fan of Shakespeare (both on the stage/screen and written page), I have added to my appreciation by reading various works about this playwright. First there was Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare, which was a well-written commentary on the historical contexts of the plays. Then, there was Harold Bloom's Shakespeare, The Invention of the Human, a scholarly work offset by a tone of high-toned intellectual snobbery and condescension. Now, there is Shakespeare After All, a work that fits between these two in quality. In Shakespeare After All, Marjorie Garber's 900+ page tome on the Bard's plays, we are given an opportunity to learn more of what makes Shakespeare Shakespeare. As a long-time Harvard and Yale lecturer on Shakespeare, Garber certainly has the credentials and experience to back up her extensive essays on the plays. If there is a problem with the book, it is only that she is perhaps too familiar with the plays and is unable to be truly critical of them. The book begins with a lengthy introduction which serves as a biography of Shakespeare and provides a bit of historical context for his body of work. Then we get a chapter on each of thirty-eight plays, including The Two Noble Kinsmen, which is not always included in Shakespeare collections. The plays are presented in rough chronological order and focus only secondarily on plot, with a greater emphasis on character and the use of language. Garber is a good writer, and each chapter is insightful. As this is written more as a collection of essays, there is not always perfect continuity between chapters and there is more than a little redundancy (which I suppose does make this easier to read this work in portions or out of order). As stated before, however, the principal flaw in her writing is that she refuses to say anything really critical about any of the plays. In Garber's view, Shakespeare batted 1.000, all hits and no misses. Henry VIII seems to be just as worthy of merit as Othello or Hamlet. Furthermore, there are no mistakes; any apparent contradictions or omissions are cleverly intended, not just an error. Certainly, Shakespeare is worth a lot of praise. When you consider what he did - writing over three dozen plays with an adeptness that is readily apparent - he is definitely deserving of the title "genius," but he wasn't perfect. It would be nice if Garber acknowledged this, but her strengths clearly outweigh her weaknesses, and if you are interested in learning more about Shakespeare's plays, this is a worthwhile way to get that education.