The Tempest [Mass Market Paperback]

One of Shakespeare's most famous but also enigmatic plays, for many years the story of Prospero's exile from his native Milan, and life with his daughter Miranda on an unnamed island in the Mediterranean, was seen as an autobiographical dramatisation of Shakespeare's departure from the London stage. The Epilogue, spoken by Prospero, claims that "now my charms are all o'erthrown", appeared to reflect Shakespeare's own renunciation of his magical dramatic powers as he retired to Stratford. But The Tempest is far more than this, as recent commentators have pointed out. The dramatic action observes the classical unities of time, place and action, as Prospero uses his "rough magic" to lure his wicked usurping brother, Antonio, and King Alonso of Naples to his island retreat to torment them before engineering his return to Milan.

However, the play is full of extraordinary anomalies and fantastic interludes, including Gonzalo's fantasy of a utopian commonwealth, Prospero's magical servant Ariel, and the "poisonous slave" Caliban. The creation of Caliban has particularly fascinated critics, who have noticed in his creation a colonial dimension to the play. In this respect Caliban can be seen as an American Indian or African slave, who articulates a particularly powerful strain of anti-colonial sentiment, telling Prospero that "this island's mine, by Sycorax my mother,/ Which thou tak'st from me". This has led to an intense reassessment of the play from a post-colonial perspective, as critics and historians have debated the extent to which the play endorses or criticises early English colonial expansion. --Jerry Brotton --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

"David Lindley's Tempest is the best edition on the market. [...] If I were ever again to undertake the editing of a Shakespeare play, I would keep Lindley's edition of The Tempest open beside me."
-Studies in Theatre and Performance (UK)

"[Lindley's] edition meets the high standards of the series in an exemplary manner, offering an especially fine introduction."
-Studies in English Literature

"David Lindley's edition of The Tempest is easily the most outstanding version of this ostensibly straightforward yet hugely teasing play produced over the last thirty years. Its precise and scrupulous commentary notes are careful to the variety of ways the text can be spoken on stage. Its notes on the music and songs are admirably evocative, and its economical account of the huge range of critical views will send thousands of readers out in fruitful chases after the play's own multitudinous interests.
- Andrew Gurr, editor of the forthcoming New Variorum Tempest --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

This New Folger Library edition of Shakespeare's The Tempest puts readers in touch with current ways of thinking about Shakespeare. The freshly edited text is based directly on what the editors consider the best early printed version of the play. Includes explanatory notes, introduction, essay and illustrations.

John Dover Wilson's New Shakespeare, published between 1921 and 1966, became the classic Cambridge edition of Shakespeare's plays and poems until the 1980s. The series, long since out-of-print, is now reissued. Each work contains a lengthy and lively introduction, main text, and substantial notes and glossary. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

black and white illustrations

David Lindley is Professor of Renaissance Literature at the School of English, University of Leeds. His published work includes The Trials of Frances Howard and a book on on the poet-composer Thomas Campion, as well as essays on court masques and articles on the relationships between music and literature. He also contributed to the Cambridge Companion to Ben Jonson (2000). --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.