Shakespeare and Language

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Catherine M. S. Alexander
Cambridge University Press, Sep 30, 2004 - Literary Collections - 294 pages
This collection of essays considers the characteristics, excitement and unique qualities of Shakespeare's language, the relationship between language and event, and the social, theatrical and literary function of language. A new introduction, by Jonathan Hope, explicates the differences between Shakespeare's language and our own, provides a theoretical and contextual framework for the pieces that follow, and makes transparent an aspect of Shakespeare's craft (and the critical response to it)that has frequently been opaque.

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Contents

Shakespeares language and the language of Shakespeares time
18
The foundations of Elizabethan language
44
Shakespeares talking animals
68
Shakespeare and the tune of the time ΙΟΙ
101
Shakespeares Romeo and Juliet the places of invention
122
Richard II
139
IO The art of the comic duologue in three plays by Shakespeare
179
Hamlets ear
201
The aesthetics of mutilation in Titus Andronicus
226
verbal echoing in Macbeth
240
style and the sexes
266
Index
290
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About the author (2004)

Catherine M. S. Alexander is a lecturer at the Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham. She is editor of The Cambridge Shakespeare Library and co-editor of Shakespeare and Race (2001) and Shakespeare and Sexuality (2001).