Shakespeare's Comedies: A Very Short Introduction

In this Very Short Introduction Bart Van Es analyses Shakespeare's comedic plays, picking out the family resemblances across these works. He considers their shared themes such as confusion and cross dressing, misguided love, twins and substitutions, and explores the bard's verbal artistry and wit.

Bart van Es studied at Cambridge and is now a University Lecturer and Fellow in English at St Catherine's College, Oxford. He is the author of Spenser's Forms of History (OUP, 2002) and Shakespeare in Company (OUP, 2013), and is the editor of A Critical Companion to Spenser Studies (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2005). He has published many articles on Renaissance poetry and drama and is now conducting research into the children's acting companies that were rivals to Shakespeare's stage.