Shakespeare's Sonnets (Nota Bene) - Softcover

"Explications and analyses that will greatly enhance a reader's understanding and enjoyment."-New York Times Book Review (on an earlier edition) "The engaging commentary-with its wit, energy, and sane conviction-makes a plea for a reading of the sonnets that values meanings which may not be intellectually convenient or the basis of a unified interpretation. For purists, the Quarto text is printed parallel to the modernized text."-Library Journal (on an earlier edition) Winner of the ninth annual James Russell Lowell Prize given by the Modern Language Association (MLA) Winner of the 1978 Explicator Literary Foundation Award "The book seems to me to be indispensable to the serious student of Shakespeare's Sonnets, as well as being a repository of relevant information and sound critical sense for 'the common reader' who wants to deepen his understanding and enjoyment of these remarkable-and often baffling-poems."-L. C. Knights (on an earlier edition)

This prize-winning work provides a facsimile of the 1609 Quarto printed in parallel with a conservatively edited, modernized text, as well as commentary that ranges from brief glosses to substantial critical essays. Stephen Booth's notes help a modern reader toward the kind of understanding that Renaissance readers brought to the works.