'A gigantic achievement! This vast journey through Shakespeare's works and worlds is constantly fascinating.' Sir Antony Sher, Honorary Associate Artist, Royal Shakespeare Company 'The Cambridge Guide to the Worlds of Shakespeare is going to be an invaluable resource for anyone taking the measure of Shakespeare's reach - across times, languages, and cultures. Only an encyclopedia, this encyclopedia, is up to ... Read morethe task.' Michael Witmore, Folger Shakespeare Library 'The editors of The Cambridge Guide to the Worlds of Shakespeare have assembled a treasure-house of informed, concise, and helpful entries. This comprehensive collection provides useful introductory essays on almost any topic in Shakespeare studies.' Tom Bishop, University of Auckland 'The worlds of Shakespeare have become more polyglot and diverse than ever before. In gathering an excellent group of scholars and tracing a horizon of yet unknown dimensions, this work is an indispensable guide for all expeditions into this universe.' Peter W. Marx, University of Cologne 'It would be hard to imagine a more thoughtful, imaginative, or comprehensive collection than this. As Dryden said of Chaucer: here is God's plenty! The essays are crisp and lucid, and they address their topics with an intellectual energy that transmits to the reader. These volumes are unlike anything currently on the market and will not find an equal for many years to come.' Laurie Maguire, University of Oxford 'Academic libraries catering for courses in English literature will obviously want to have this. I would also recommend volume one as a useful source of all sorts of miscellaneous information for historians interested in specialised aspects of late Tudor and early Jacobean England - from paper-making to cosmetics to garden design and volume two to readers interested in aspects of cultural changes over the past four centuries. Most university libraries will certainly find readers for it.' Martin Guha, Reference Reviews Show Less