William Empson: Essays on Renaissance Literature: Volume 2, The Drama

This collection of William Empson’s essays on Elizabethan and Jacobean drama is the second volume of his writings on Renaissance literature. Edited with an introduction by the leading Empson scholar John Haffenden, the contents range from famous essays on The Spanish Tragedy, Volpone, The Alchemist and The Duchess of Malfi to a sprightly piece on Elizabethan spirits. In addition, there are previously unpublished essays which revisit critical controversies, and a magnificent, provocative study of A Midsummer Night’s Dream which ventures a major new reading of the play. ‘I am attracted by the notion of a hearty indifference to one’s own and other people’s feelings, when a fragment of the truth is in question,’ Empson stated. The incomparable Empson here fights his own critical corner with unequalled zest, intelligence and insight.

• Major collection of essays – some previously unpublished – by one of the century’s most distinguished literary critics • Follows the very successful first volume of Empson’s writings on Renaissance literature • Major readings of Renaissance dramatists, including Shakespeare

Sources and acknowledgements; Introduction; Part I. Kyd, Jonson, Webster: 1. The Spanish Tragedy (I); 2. The Spanish Tragedy: a letter; 3. The Spanish Tragedy (II); 4. Volpone; 5. Volpone again; 6. The Alchemist; 7. ‘Mine eyes dazzle’; 8. The Duchess of Malfi; Part II. Shakespeare and the Spirits: 9. Elizabethan spirits; 10. The spirits of the Dream; Notes; Index.