Reading Room - Shakespeare's Theatre

J. Leeds Barroll, Politics, Plague and Shakespeare's Theater (1991) – fascinating account of how Shakespeare's output in the Jacobean years was affected by theatre closure due to plague

Alan Dessen, Recovering Shakespeare's Theatrical Vocabulary (1995) – good on nuts and bolds of Elizabethan theatre practice

Andrew Gurr, The Shakespearean Stage (3rd edn, 1992) and Playgoing in Shakespeare's London (3rd edn, 2004) – accessible and full of information about the theatres of Shakespeare's time

Roslyn Knutson, The Repertory of Shakespeare's Company 1594-1613 (1991) – the plays in the contexts of others put on by the Chamberlain's/King's Men

David Lindley, Shakespeare and Music (2006) – exemplary study of theatrical uses of music, as well as the period's philosophical attitudes to music

A New History of Early English Drama , edited by J. D. Cox and D. S. Kastan (1997) – leading-edge scholarship on every aspect of the Elizabethan and Jacobean theatre, the writing and printing of plays; should be high on any student's list

Tiffany Stern, Rehearsal from Shakespeare to Sheridan (2000) – the best behind-the-scenes account of how Shakespeare's companies put on his plays

Jean Wilson, The Archaeology of Shakespeare (1995) – not only excellent on the Rose and the Globe, but also makes fascinating use of other artefacts such as funeral monuments

There are hundreds more fine books on Shakespeare, but anyone who reads The RSC Shakespeare: Complete Works from cover to cover and then devours a reasonable proportion of the above will have earned the right to consider themselves an exceptionally highly informed Shakespearean.