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Shakespeare and His Contemporaries

This guide was created for students at SCSU who are studying Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

Internet Resources - Shakespeare

  • Absolute Shakespeare This is an essential resource for William Shakespeare's plays, sonnets, poems, quotes, biography, and the Globe Theatre.
  • Folger Shakespeare Library
    The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, is home to one of the world’s largest and finest collection of Shakespeare materials and to major collections of other rare Renaissance books, manuscripts, and works of art. Its well-known public programs include plays, concerts, literary readings, family activities, and exhibitions, as well as numerous K-12 and college programs for students and teachers. The Folger also publishes the illustrated, completely re-edited Folger Editions of Shakespeare's plays, award-winning exhibition catalogs, and the journal Shakespeare Quarterly.
  • Internet Shakespeare Editions
    This website contains a wealth of information on Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Era. The section Life and Times on this website includes biographical information as well as information on Shakespeare's stage, society, history, drama, literature, plays, and reference resources.
  • Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet
    This site contains Shakespeare's biography, works and criticism as well as numerous links to other Shakespearean sites. It is an annotated guide to the scholarly Shakespeare resources on the Internet
  • Open Source Shakespeare
    Open Source Shakesepare is intended to be the best free web site containing Shakespeare's complete works. It is intended for scholars, thespians, and Shakespeare lovers of every kind.It includes the Globe Edition of the complete works which was the definitive single-volume Shakespeare edition for over half a century.
  • Shakespeare.Com An excellent site that is dedicated to the needs of students who may want to criticize and interpret Shakespeare's works. Also has useful tips for teachers of Shakespeare.
  • Shakespeare Documented
    Shakespeare Documented is a project of the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Bodleian Library, the British Library, the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, and the National Archives. It is the largest and most authoritative collection of primary-source materials documenting the life of William Shakespeare in four sections - Shakespeare the playwright; Shakespeare the poet; Family, legal and property records, and 17th century legacies.
  • Shakespeare Quartos
    The Shakespeare Quartos archive is a digital collection of pre-1642 editions of Shakespeare's plays.
  • Shakespeare Resource Center Contains links to Shakespeare's biography, works, synopsis of Shakespeare's plays, authorship debate, language, the Globe, Elizabethan English, and much more.
  • Shakespeare's Staging University of California, Berkeley's Shakespeare's Staging site explores the history of Shakespeare performance through images, videos, essays and bibliographies. It is a valuable resource for teachers and students of Shakespeare as well as for performers and directors of the plays.
  • Treasures in Full: Shakespeare in Quarto
    This site contains the British Library's digitized versions of Shakespeare's Quartos.

Internet Resources - Shakespeare's Contemporaries

Beaumont and Fletcher: The Theatre Database
Links to biographies, bibliography, quotes, poetry, synopses of plays and analysis of their important works.

Chapman, George
Contains Chapman's biography and links to his works that are available for purchase.

Jonson, Ben
Links to biography, bibliography, brief synopses and analysis of his most important works.

Kyd, Thomas
This site contains the biography, works and study materials for Thomas Kyd.

Internet Shakespeare: Shakespeare's Contemporaries
Provides information on the literature, life and times of Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

Marlowe, Christopher: The Poetry Foundation
The foundation aims to make the works of poets more visible, Contains biographical information on Marlowe and links to his poems. 

The Marlowe Society
Celebrates the life and works of Christopher Marlowe.

Poems by Elizabethan Dramatists (The Poetry Archive)
The Poetry Archive is a not-for-profit organization that produces, acquires and preserves recordings of poets reading their own work out loud. Contains poems by Lyly, Ford, Peele. Fletcher, Massinger, Dekker, and other sixteenth century dramatists.

Shakespeare's Contemporaries - Royal Shakespeare Company
The RSC performs Shakespeare's plays as well as plays by Shakespeare's contemporaries.