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This new edition of Shakespeare´s anarchic comedy, developed by and for the RSC, includes new interviews with acclaimed directors Paul Hunter, Nancy Meckler and Tim Supple, looks at specific productions in the play´s history, and an illuminating introduction by acclaimed scholar Jonathan Bate.

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From the Royal Shakespeare Company - a modern, definitive edition of Shakespeare´s anarchic comedy. With an expert introduction by Sir Jonathan Bate, this unique edition presents a historical overview of The Comedy of Errors in performance, takes a detailed look at specific productions, and recommends film versions. Included in this edition are interviews with three leading directors - Paul Hunter, Nancy Meckler and Tim Supple - providing an illuminating insight into the extraordinary variety of interpretations that are possible. This edition also includes an essay on Shakespeare´s career and Elizabethan theatre, and enables the reader to understand the play as it was originally intended - as living theatre to be enjoyed and performed.

Ideal for students, theatre-goers, actors and general readers, the RSC Shakespeare editions offer a fresh, accessible and contemporary approach to reading and rediscovering Shakespeare´s works for the twenty-first century.

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Introduction.- About the Text.- Key Facts.- The Comedy of Errors.- Textual Notes.- Scene-by-Scene Analysis.- The Comedy of Errors in Performance: The RSC and Beyond.- Four Centuries of The Comedy of Errors: An Overview.- At the RSC.- The Director´s Cut: interviews with Paul Hunter, Nancy Meckler and Tim Supple.- Shakespeare´s Career in the Theatre.- Shakespeare´s Works: A Chronology.- Further Reading and Viewing.- References.- Acknowledgements and Picture Credits

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JONATHAN BATE Professor of Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature, University of Warwick, UK, and the editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He has held visiting posts at Harvard, Yale and UCLA and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Fellow of the British Academy, an Honorary Fellow of St Catherine´s College, Cambridge, and a Governor and Board member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. A prominent critic, award-winning biographer and broadcaster, he is the author of several books on Shakespeare, including The Genius of Shakespeare (Picador), which was praised by Sir Peter Hall, founder of the RSC, as ´the best modern book on Shakespeare.´ In June 2006 he was awarded a CBE by HM The Queen ´for services to Higher Education´.

ERIC RASMUSSEN Professor of English at the University of Nevada, USA, and the Textual Editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He is co-editor of the Norton Anthology of English Renaissance Drama and has edited volumes in both the Arden Shakespeare and Oxford World´s Classics series. He is the General Textual Editor of the Internet Shakespeare Editions project - one of the most visited Shakespeare websites in the world. For over nine years he has written the annual review of editions and textual studies for the Shakespeare Survey.

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