Series Editor's Preface
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction
Dictionary
Primary Bibliography
Secondary Bibliography
Index by Play
Index of entries
An A to Z reference guide to religious terms, concepts and references in Shakespeare.
R.Chris Hassel, Jr. is Professor of English Emeritus at Vanderbilt University, USA.
"...the subtitle Dictionary...is a misnomer for Hassel's invaluable
assemblage. He does much more than supply definitions for the
religious language in Shakespeare's plays..." "Hassel's entries are
on the mark, clear and graceful...the degree of his specificity is
remarkable." "Everywhere I looked in Hassel's entries, I spied
learning, deep and wide...Interspersed throughout the Dictionary
are pearls of literary insight." "...a valuable and sure guide."
Philip C. Kolin, University of Southern Mississippi. Review
published in Christianity and Literature
55.2, Winter 2006.
"This volume is one of the most impressive of the Athlone
Shakespeare Dictionaries to appear. Given the recent scholarly
interest in the dramatist's religious milieu, it will be a most
useful addition to Shakespearean and Renaissance holdings...This
volume is a necessary companion to Naseeb Shaheen's Biblical
References in Shakespeare's Plays."
*American Reference Books Annual*
"Anyone writing a major, authoritative new reference work on
Shakespeare and the Bible needs extraordinarily confident faith and
persistent patience. R. Chris Hassel surely had both to have
compiled Shakespeare's Religious Language, the product no doubt of
decades of fruitful, hard work. Shakespeare and the bible has been
the subject of much substantial scholarship as the 23-page
"Secondary Bibliography" appended to Hassel's book attests. Hassel
does much more than supply definitions for the religious language
in Shakespeare's plays. Many of his entries are periscopes of great
worth for literary critics and students of theology alike. He
explores and explicates the figurative language in the plays and
poems that manifests ‘Shakespeare's most informed and imaginative
religious usage' (xxii) and provides a running summary of
scholarship on a particular term or phrase through references to
the plethora of critical studies cited in his ‘Second
Bibliography.'. Moreover, and even more impressively, Hassel gives
us a capstone history of the dominant creeds and polemics of the
age by copiously cross-referencing and judiciously quoting from
contemporary theological literature (sermons, treatises, tracts)
where Shakespeare's religious terms are also found and from which
he may have borrowed. Quoting Sandra Clark, editor of the Athlone
Series, Hassel points out that ‘half of all books extant between
1583 and 1623 were theological.' In light of such a devoutly
Christian culture, it is not surprising that the ‘amount and the
range of Shakespeare's religious usage show him to be an unusually
well-informed Christian layman even in the midst of this unusually
well-informed Christian era' (xix). Hassel's entries are on the
mark, clear and graceful. They range from a few short sentences
(e.g., ban, confession, doctor, indulgence, procession, tithe pig,
toll, St.Steven) to mini essays (e.g., despair, fools, grace,
heaven, idolatry, Jew, miracles, sin). The degree of his
specificity is remarkable. Anyone who seeks information on
Shakespeare's religious language—it's meaning, documentation,
scope, sources and context—will find in Hassel's dictionary a
valuable and sure guide. Had Hassel's Dictionary been available,
John Bunyan, I am convinced, would have kept it on his
bookshelf."
"Chris Hassel is the right scholar to grasp the nettle of
Shakespeare's religious language, since Hassel's authority where
Shakespeare and religion are concerned is well established.
"...this dictionary is a mine of helpful information, and everyone
will learn something from it."- John D. Cox, Shakespeare Quarterly,
58.1, 2007
*Shakespeare Quarterly*
"This book mantains the high quality of previous volumes in the
Athlone Shakespeare Dictionary Series... useful for research in
both Elizabethan music and Shakespeare's use of music.... This is
an authoritative volume that will be an important addition to
collections in Elizabethan literature and music"
*American Reference Books Annual*
'Shakespeare's Religious Language, will undoubtedly become a useful
source of systemised information and a helpful tool for further
scholarly research in this area.'
*European English Messenger, The*
'The great strength of Hassel's dictionary is that it is more than
a dictionary, stepping past vocabulary into context... scrupulous
in explaining what words need not mean...quicker and handier than
an online concordance...and goes well beyond a dictionary's basic
briefs; the helpfully selective bibliography is particularly strong
on recent criticism...it should retain long-term value as a
reference work, both for those in search of proof texts and those
fascinated by the sinuous operation of Shakespearean religious
metaphor.'
*Times Literary Supplement*
The serendipity of browsing through this volume will open up the
subject of Shakespeare and religion for even the most casual of
readers, and the reader might discover something new.
*Around the Globe*
In a scholarly world that has awakened to Shakespeare's theological
interests, it's a valuable reference work, especially for its
definitions of terms that are no longer current (‘compt’ or
‘sacring’ or ‘shrift’).
*First Things*
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