Courteous Exchanges explores the significant overlap between Edmund Spenser’s Faerie Queene and Shakespeare’s plays, showing how both facilitate the critique of Renaissance aristocratic identity. Moving from a consideration of Castiglione’s Book of the Courtier as a text that encouraged reader engagement, the book offers new readings of Shakespeare’s plays in conjunction with Spenser. It pairs Love’s Labour’s Lost, Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, and The Winter’s Tale with The Faerie Queene in order to explore how topics such as education, gender, religion, race, and aristocratic identity are offered up to reader and audience interpretation.
Courteous Exchanges explores the significant overlap between Edmund Spenser’s Faerie Queene and Shakespeare’s plays, showing how both facilitate the critique of Renaissance aristocratic identity. Moving from a consideration of Castiglione’s Book of the Courtier as a text that encouraged reader engagement, the book offers new readings of Shakespeare’s plays in conjunction with Spenser. It pairs Love’s Labour’s Lost, Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, and The Winter’s Tale with The Faerie Queene in order to explore how topics such as education, gender, religion, race, and aristocratic identity are offered up to reader and audience interpretation.
Barnes & Noble is the world’s largest retail bookseller and a leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products. Our Nook Digital business offers a lineup of NOOK® tablets and e-Readers and an expansive collection of digital reading content through the NOOK Store®. Barnes & Noble’s mission is to operate the best omni-channel specialty retail business in America, helping both our customers and booksellers reach their aspirations, while being a credit to the communities we serve.
