Professor C. J. Sisson has since 1951 been Assistant Director and Senior Fellow at the Shakespeare Institute in the University of Birmingham, Stratford-on-Avon. He has held a succession of distinguished academic posts including the Lord Northcliffe Professorship of Modern English Literature, University College, London, and has been Editor of the Modern Language Review since 1928. He has published much work, of permanent value, on Shakespeare and his age, including his recent one-volume edition of the complete Works, and in this masterly essay he surveys the entire history of the attitudes to Shakespeare taken up by scholars, critics, writers, and the playgoing public in succeeding centuries. The result is an extremely interesting, clear, and valuable guide through the vast literature of the subject.
The survey is accompanied by Mr. J. R. Brown’s Select Bibliography, prepared in collaboration with Professor Sisson as a reading guide for the lecturer and student.