Product Description

Separated from her twin brother Sebastian after a shipwreck, Viola disguises herself as a boy to serve the Duke of Illyria. Wooing a countess on his behalf, she is stunned to find herself the object of his beloved’s affections. With the arrival of Viola’s brother, and a trick played upon the countess’s steward, confusion reigns in this romantic comedy of mistaken identity.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #80178 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 240 pages

About the Author
Michael Dobson is currently Professor of Renaissance Drama at Roehampton University, London. Stanley Wells is Emeritus Professor of the University of Birmingham and Chairman of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. Michael Dobson is currently Professor of Renaissance Drama at Roehampton University, London. Stanley Wells is Emeritus Professor of the University of Birmingham and Chairman of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

Customer Reviews

Shakespeare's best comedy, beautifully presented
You don't need me to tell you Twelfth Night is a wonderful play -- what you need is this new Penguin edition, which has the best introduction to the play on the market and at the lowest price going. The introductory material on the play's themes and its possibilities in the theatre and on screen is nearly as funny, sexy and engaging as the play itself. I'm almost glad my old Arden copy fell apart so that I had to buy this one -- it really is fresher and livelier.

Smartpass makes studying a play entertaining and fun
SmartPass is great audio format and easy to access for a variety of kids
I facilitate 10 home educated students studying English for GCSE. The SmartPass material for Twelfth Night really helped the group to enjoy and understand the play. They achieved good grades for the Shakespeare component of their coursework, and all scored B or above.
The SmartPass material we used consisted of two audio presentations of a fully dramatised production of Twelfth Night. One version contains the play and integrated commentary, the other is an uninterrupted rendition. At first I thought the commentary would be intrusive, however, after only a few minutes listening I was "hooked" and realised that I was enjoying both commentary and play. More importantly my daughter was also engrossed and learned far more from listening to the commentary than she ever would from me.
The commentator or "Passmaster" puts the action into context and highlights themes, symbols and motifs as they arise in the play. I found her voice very engaging which is important in a primarily audio product. Full transcripts of both the play and commentary are also provided as PDF files. This helps in searching and making notes. The teachers pack also contains suggestions for interesting group activities. These additional features are helpful in supporting curriculum and specification study by the teacher.
My group is unusual in that we have few formal lessons with a "proper" teacher and hence study the play at home. Some students struggle with text because of dyslexic tendencies and SmartPass helped them to study Twelfth Night on their own without that stress.
The material is a provided in MP3 format which means it can be used on portable music players/phones or CDs. The beauty of this delivery is that the audio can be appreciated in short sections anywhere according to the student's concentration and environment. In fact my daughter happily listened to the SmartPass rendition of Macbeth in the car even though she wasn't studying that play and other entertainment was available.
I was impressed with the SmartPass material for Twelfth Night and Macbeth and would recommend them for study and enjoyment.