Focusing on the clown Will Kemp, this book shows how Shakespeare and other dramatists wrote specific roles as vehicles for him.

A new account of medieval and Renaissance clown traditions reveals the true extent of their cultural influence.

Introduction -- Clowns, fools, and folly -- Structural doubleness and repetition -- Place, being, and agency -- The manifestation of desire -- The return from t

Why are certain words used as insults in Shakespeare's world and what do these words do and say? Shakespeare's plays abound with insults which are more often me

The majority of Shakespeare's plays have at least one clown figure making an appearance. These characters range from rogues who say only a line or two, to impor