Beyond a Common Joy: An Introduction to Shakespearean Comedy (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780803215740)

In this engaging introduction to the 'First Folio' comedies, Paul Olson gives a persuasive account of Shakespeare's comic transcendence, showing how, by taking on the great themes of his time, he elevated comedy from a mere mid-level literary form to its own form of greatness, on par with epic and tragedy.

Paul A. Olson is Kate Foster Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the author of several books, including The Kingdom of Science: Literary Utopianism and British Education, 1612-1870 (Nebraska 2003) and The Journey to Wisdom: Self-Education in Patristic and Medieval Literature (Nebraska 1995).