Access the full text.
Sign up today, get DeepDyve free for 14 days.
References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.
Measure for Measure most likely has been the greatest "problem" among the plays so designated ever since W. W. Lawrence's 1931 study.l But long before Lawrence's official categorizing, Measure for Measure had generated extreme views. Dr. Johnson, for instance, found it "darkened ... by the peculiarities of its author";2 Coleridge could not suspend his disbelief: "it is a hateful work";3 yet "D. G." in the preface to the Cumberland Acting Edition (1830) felt that "To the enlightened mind [Measure for Measure] will prove a source of delight.,,4 Early in the twentieth century John Masefield lamented that "the play is seldom performed . . . . It is one of the greatest works of the English mind";5 but John Dover Wilson was certain that Shakespeare at the time was in a mood of "self-laceration, weariness, and disgust.,,6 However, in his seminal essay "Measure for Measure and the Gospels" in The Wheel of Fire (1930), G. Wilson Knight led the way to new and more positive approaches to the play. For Knight, the work is allegorical in tone, the Duke quasi-divine, and "the ethical standards of the Gospels are rooted in Measure for Measure.'" Knight, though building on earlier adumbrations,
Explorations in Renaissance Culture – Brill
Published: Dec 2, 1986
Read and print from thousands of top scholarly journals.
Already have an account? Log in
Bookmark this article. You can see your Bookmarks on your DeepDyve Library.
To save an article, log in first, or sign up for a DeepDyve account if you don’t already have one.
Copy and paste the desired citation format or use the link below to download a file formatted for EndNote
Access the full text.
Sign up today, get DeepDyve free for 14 days.
All DeepDyve websites use cookies to improve your online experience. They were placed on your computer when you launched this website. You can change your cookie settings through your browser.