From one of the world’s premier Shakespeare scholars comes a magisterial new study whose premise is “that Shakespeare makes modern culture and that modern culture makes Shakespeare.”

        Shakespeare has determined many of the ideas that we think of as “naturally” true: ideas about human character, individuality and selfhood, government, leadership, love and jealousy, men and women, youth and age. Marjorie Garber delves into ten plays to explore the interrelationships between Shakespeare and contemporary culture, from James Joyce’sUlyssesto George W. Bush’s reading list. From the persistence of difference inOthelloto the matter of character inHamletto the untimeliness of youth inRomeo and Juliet, Garber discusses how these ideas have been re-imagined in modern fiction, theater, film, and the news, and in the literature of psychology, sociology, political theory, business, medicine, and law.Shakespeare and Modern Cultureis a brilliant recasting of our own mental and emotional landscape as refracted through the prism of the protean Shakespeare.

From the Trade Paperback edition.