Description
Book SynopsisReading Shakespeare's Poetry A lively exploration of Shakespeare's poems and how they speak to readers
Reading Shakespeare's Poetry presents a fresh interpretation of Shakespeare's non-dramatic poems, providing insights into the individual poems, their themes and composition, and their relation to the cultural context of Shakespeare's world. Dympna Callaghan considers what makes Shakespeare's language poetic and shows how his poetry is comprised not only of lyrical intensity but also of the language of everyday life.
Presented chronologically, lucidly-written chapters examine Venus and Adonis, Lucrece, The Phoenix and the Turtle, the Sonnets, and A Lover's Complaint. Special attention is paid to the distinctive ways in which lineation, rhyme, verse forms, and meter serve to delineate or erase the boundaries of Shakespeare's poetry. Throughout the book, the author explains how Shakespeare's language is influenced by predecessors such as
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments viii
Introduction 1
1 Venus and Adonis 25
2 Lucrece 82
3 The Phoenix and the Turtle 129
4 Shakespeare’s Sonnets 159
5 A Lover’s Complaint 209
Conclusion 240
Bibiography 251
Index 262
