Hamlet

This self-contained, free-standing volume gives readers the Second Quarto text. In his illustrated introduction to the play's historical, cultural, and performance contexts, Neil Taylor presents a thorough survey of critical approaches to the play. He addresses the challenges faced in reading, editing, or acting a play with the depth of content and tradition that "Hamlet "possesses. He also establishes the historical and cultural context in which the play was written and explains the arguments about the merits and deficiencies of the First and Second Quarto and the First Folio. Taylor points to the many novelists, both men and women, whose work refers to or bears commonalities with "Hamlet," to suggest an ongoing to need to resolve "the continuing mystery of "Hamlet"" in print and on stage. An appendix contains the additional passages found only in the 1623 text, and other appendices on the editorial process, the traditions regarding the act division at 3.4/4.1, casting, and music are also included.

Table of Contents
List of illustrations
General editors' preface
Preface

INTRODUCTION
The challenges of "Hamlet"
"" The challenge of acting "Hamlet"
The challenge of editing "Hamlet"
The challenge to the greatness of "Hamlet" "Hamlet" versus "Lear"
"Hamlet" in our time
The soliloquies and the modernity of "Hamlet"
"Hamlet" and Freud
Reading against the "Hamlet" tradition
"Hamlet" in Shakespeare's time
"Hamlet" at the turn of the century
The challenge of dating "Hamlet"
Was there an earlier "Hamlet" play?
Are there any early references to Shakespeare's play?
Can we date "Hamlet" in relation to other contemporary plays?
"Hamlet"'s first performances
The story of "Hamlet"
Murder most foul
An antic disposition
Sentences', speeches and thoughts
The composition of "Hamlet"
The quartos and the Folio
The quartos
The First Folio
The relationship of Q2 to Q1
The relationship of F to Q2
What, then, of Q1?
Editorial practice
Why a three-text edition?
"Hamlet" on stage and screen
Hamlet and his points
Enter the director
"Hamlet" and politics
Novel Hamlets
Hamlet meets Fielding, Goethe, Dickens and others
"Hamlet" and women novelists
Prequels and sequels
The continuing mystery of "Hamlet"
""
""THE TRAGICAL HISTORY OF HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK (The Second Quarto, 1604-5)

APPENDICES
Appendix 1: Folio-only passages
Appendix 2: Textual discussion
Appendix 3: Editorial conventions, sample edited passages and a comparison of scenes across the three texts
Appendix 4: The act division at 3.4/4.1
Appendix 5: Casting
Appendix 6: Music

Abbreviations and references
Abbreviations used in notes
Works by and partly by Shakespeare
Editions of Shakespeare collated
Other works cited

Index"

Drama / Ficção / Literatura Estrangeira