Shakespeare and the Nature of Women

JULIET DUSINBERRE has lectured and published in Japan, the USA, Australia, Germany, France and Sweden. She is currently editing As You Like It for Arden 3. Other work includes Alice to the Lighthouse (1987) and Virginia Woolf's Renaissance: Woman Reader or Common Reader? (1997). She is a Fellow of Girton College, Cambridge.

• Acknowledgements Preface to the Third Edition Preface to the Second Edition Introduction The Idea of Chastity The Problem of Equality Gods and Devils Femininity and Masculinity Shakespeare Works Cited Index

'Shakespeare and the Nature of Women gives a voice not just to women in Shakespeare but to women in Shakespeare studies. It's a courageous, feisty, intellectually ambitious and beautifully written book that, having launched the Shakespeare revolution for women a generation ago, remains just as challenging for readers today. A classic.' - Professor Carol Rutter, Department of English and Theatre Studies, University of Warwick 'First published in 1975, Dusinberre's boldly pathbreaking book helped establish the field of feminist Shakespeare studies. With its wideranging attention to gender ideology and to the complex conditions of theatrical performance on the early modern stage, Shakespeare and the Nature of Women has continued to influence generations of scholars, readers, and actors. An insightful and impassioned critic, Dusinberre not only offers provocative and fresh readings of Shakespeare's plays but has changed the very terms through which scholars study the theatrical culture of early modern London.' - Professor Jean Howard, Department of English, Columbia University 'Shakespeare and the Nature of Women is a seminal book in feminist literary criticism and Shakespeare Studies. Written by a critic of international standing, its combination of original scholarship with innovative feminist cultural analysis demonstrated the centrality of a peculiar, even paradoxical conception of female identity to the Shakespearean dramatic tradition and established an immensely rich tradition of feminist criticism of Shakespeare. Its argument is just as fresh, exciting and thought-provoking today as when it was first written. Indeed, Dusinberre's work is of vital importance in current debates about the complex cultural phenomenon of the boy actor.' - Dr Pippa Berry, King's College, University of Cambridge