Courteous Exchanges

Courteous Exchanges explores the significant overlap between Edmund Spensers Faerie Queene and Shakespeares plays, showing how both facilitate the critique of Renaissance aristocratic identity. Moving from a consideration of Castigliones Book of the Courtier as a text that encouraged reader engagement, the book offers new readings of Shakespeares plays in conjunction with Spenser. It pairs Loves Labours Lost, Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, and The Winters Tale with The Faerie Queene in order to explore how topics such as education, gender, religion, race, and aristocratic identity are offered up to reader and audience interpretation. -- .