“ [Henry James'] essay's closing lines can either be read neutrally or as a more purposeful wish that this mystery [of Shakespeare's authorship] will one day be resolved by the 'criticism of the future'… James Shapiro
“ It may take a decade or two before the extent of Shakespeare's collaboration passes from the graduate seminar to the undergraduate lecture, and finally to popular biography, by which time it will be o… James Shapiro
“ Malone's commentary on Sonnet 93 was a defining moment in the history not only of Shakespeare studies but also of literary biography in general. What has emerged in our time as a dominant form of life… James Shapiro
“ We've inherited many ideas about writing that emerged in the eighteenth century, especially an interest in literature as both an expression and an exploration of the self. This development part of w… James Shapiro
“ Shakespeare didn’t conceive of his tragedy in Aristotelian terms—that is, as a tragedy of the fall of a flawed great man—but rather as a collision of deeply held and irreconcilable principles, embodie… James Shapiro
“ Genius may be a necessary precondition for creating a masterpiece but it’s never a sufficient one. James Shapiro
“ Albany had declared that All friends shall taste / The wages of their virtue, and all foes / The cup of their deservings (24.297–99). James Shapiro
“ Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more James Shapiro
“ By wrenching this increasingly outdated revenge play into the present, Shakespeare forced his contemporaries to experience what he felt and what his play registers so profoundly: the world had changed… James Shapiro
“ Shakespeare’s way out of the dilemma of writing plays as pleasing at court as they were at the public theater was counterintuitive. Rather than searching for the lowest common denominator, he decided… James Shapiro
“ First, my fear; then, my curtsy; last my speech. My fear is your displeasure; my curtsy, my duty; and my speech, to beg your pardons. James Shapiro
“ Soothsayer’s warning to Antony in Antony and Cleopatra, If thou dost play with him at any game, / Thou art sure to lose (2.3.26–27), James Shapiro
“ Sonnet 138, which begins: When my love swears that she is made of truth, / I do believe her though I know she lies). James Shapiro
“ Is his benevolent art meant to distract us from Prospero’s absolutist exercise of authority over his subjects? James Shapiro
