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William Shakespeare's «Romeo and Juliet» is considered to be one of the greatest tragic love stories of all time. Romeo who is a member of the house of Montague falls in love with Juliet who is a member of the house of Capulet. The Montagues and the Capulets have been engaged in a feud for many years and as such the love between Romeo and Juliet is forbidden. Written near the end of the 16th century, «Romeo and Juliet,» which is one of Shakespeare's earliest dramas, is the story of love that can never be realized and the tragedy that ensues.

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William Shakespeare's «Measure for Measure» takes place in the Austrian city of Vienna, which is ruled by Lord Angelo. Lord Angelo believes that there is too much debauchery in the city and seeks to more strictly enforce laws against certain sexual activities. The story centers on Claudio who has impregnated his fiancee Juliet outside the bonds of marriage. Despite their plans to marry Lord Angelo wishes to make an example of Claudio by sentencing him to death.

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Perhaps one of Shakespeare's most adventure-filled plays, «Pericles» follows the extended sailing journeys of a young prince. Pericles is forced to flee Antioch when he correctly guesses a riddle that reveals the incestuous activity of King Antiochus. Unable to stay at home in Tyre because of Antiochus' vengeance, he sails away and ends up shipwrecked in Pentapolis, where he fights for and wins a princess named Thaisa. The trials and tribulations of this couple and their daughter Marina fill the remaining acts of «Pericles» with grief and trepidation, as well as joy and a truly heartwarming reunion. A laudable component of Shakespeare's collection of plays, «Pericles, Prince of Tyre» is a compelling story of family and struggle that resonates with readers even today.

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Considered to be Shakespeare's most ornately intellectual plays, «Love's Labour's Lost» is a mental adventure in hilarity and wit. Filled with lexical puns, literary allusions, and shifting poetic forms, it is a rich example of the Bard's linguistic mastery. The play opens with King Phillip of Naverre announcing that the men of his court will devote the coming years to ascetic studies. To reduce distractions, no women will be allowed into the court. A series of hilarious events ensue. The women of the court form an alliance to gain entrance, while the men try to escape to find love. «Love's Labour's Lost» shows eros at its most bewildering and beguiling.

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This comprehensive anthology provides every single one of Shakespeare's tragedy plays, from the earliest «Titus Andronicus» to «Coriolanus.» Follow one of the greatest love stories ever told in perhaps his most widely known play, «Romeo and Juliet.» In this classic tale, the two young lovers are members of feuding families, but they believe that their love transcends their families' hate. In «Othello,» a Moorish general in the Venetian army is destroyed because of the jealousy and envy that his ensign Iago holds for the distinguished Othello. «Antony and Cleopatra» is a love story about the two real-life lovers Mark Antony of Rome and Queen Cleopatra of Egypt. It is a story of jealousy, power, and death as the two lovers must deal with political unrest amidst their passionate love affair. Other plays included in the collection are «Hamlet,» «Julius Caesar,» and «Macbeth.» In typical Shakespearian fashion the tragedy of these plays is underscored by the fact that in many cases it could have been avoided if not for the fatal flaws of the principal characters. «The Complete Plays (The Tragedies: Volume I of III)» reminds readers of the genius that Shakespeare had for seeing the tragic consequences that men's choices often create for themselves.

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"Twelfth Night" is the story of Orsino, a nobleman in the kingdom if Illyria. Following a shipwreck Orsino employs Viola, who when abandoned by the shipwreck disguises herself as a man named Cesario. Soon Viola falls in love with Orsino, however Orsino is in love with Lady Olivia who has fallen for Viola, believing her to be a man. «Twelfth Night» is a classic Shakespearean comedy of mistaken identities.

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One of Shakespeare's early comedies, «The Merry Wives of Windsor» is unique among the plays for its exclusive focus on the middle class of Elizabethan England. The main character is a fat knight, Sir John Falstaff, who tries to woo two married women for money. They quickly discover his scheming and trick him numerous times in return, creating memorable, humorous scenes at Falstaff's expense. An additional thread is woven into the story concerning the daughter of one of the wives, who loves a man of whom her parents do not approve. Most likely written at the personal request of Queen Elizabeth for a court occasion, this cast of strong female characters fills the stage with spirited action, not always without irony, and creates a plot overlaid with such timeless themes as marriage, cuckoldry, wealth, social class, and love.

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William Shakespeare's «Henry V» is the historical English drama of its title character. King Henry V ascends to the throne of England following the death of his father at the beginning of the play. The King soon makes a claim to parts of France based on some distant ancestral ties. When Dauphin, prince of France responds insultingly to Henry's claim, King Henry V orders England to invade France and the two nations soon find themselves at war.

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Many consider the tragedy of «Hamlet» to be Shakespeare's masterpiece and one of the greatest plays of all time. It has entertained audiences for centuries and the role of Hamlet is one of the most sought after by actors. It is the story of Hamlet, the Prince of Denmark who learns of the death of his father at the hands of his uncle, Claudius. Claudius murders Hamlet's father, his own brother, to take the throne of Denmark and to marry Hamlet's widowed mother. Hamlet is sunk into a state of great despair as a result of discovering the murder of his father and the infidelity of his mother. Hamlet is torn between his great sadness and his desire for the revenge of his father's murder. «Hamlet» is a work of great complexity and as such has drawn many different critical interpretations. Hamlet has been seen as a victim of circumstance, as an impractical idealist, as the sufferer of an Oedipus complex, as an opportunist wishing to kill his Uncle not for revenge but to ascend to the throne, as the sufferer of a great melancholy, and as a man blinded by his desire for revenge. The true motivations of Hamlet are complex and enigmatic and have been debated for centuries. Read this classic tragedy and decide for yourself where Hamlet's true motivations lie and how they influence his ultimate demise.

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It is entirely probable that the date of «The Tempest» is 1611, and that this was the last play completed by Shakespeare before he retired from active connection with the theater to spend the remainder of his life in leisure in his native town of Stratford-on-Avon. The main thread of the plot of the drama seems to have been some folk-tale of a magician and his daughter, which, in the precise form in which Shakespeare knew it, has not been recovered. The storm and the island were, it is believed, suggested by the wreck on the Bermudas in 1609 of one of the English expeditions to Virginia. Traces are found, too, of the author’s reading in contemporary books of travel. But the plot itself is of less importance than usual. Supernatural elements are introduced with great freedom, and the dramatist’s interest was clearly not in the reproduction of lifelike events. The presentation of character and the attractive picturing of the beauty of magnanimity and forgiveness are the things which, along with its delightful poetry, make the charm of this play. It is not to be wondered at that readers have frequently been led to find in the figure of the great magician, laying aside his robes and wonder-working rod in a spirit of love and peace toward all men, a symbol of the dramatist himself at the close of his great career; and it is surely legitimate to play with this idea without assuming that Shakespeare consciously embodied it. One can hardly conceive a more fitting epilogue to the volume which is the crown of the world’s dramatic literature than the romance of «The Tempest.»

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