As the General Editor of the Peter Lang Shakespeare Series which published this, I have read several MSS, this by far the best. Hugh Richmond begins with an essential question, one my wife and I have discussed for fifteen years: do modern plays really attempt to depress? HR cites this case. A spectator worried about a play 'by a leading modern dramatist which had made a profound effect on her: she was miserable for weeks afterwards. Apparently this was just the effect intended by the playwright, the director and actors, and endorsed by the reviewers'(p5,6). HR argues when directors do Shakespeare tragedy this way, they are entirely misunderstanding tragedy, which exhilarates--especially Shakespeare’s, so roundly condemned by the French for his mixing comedy and low characters with high.
He reviews nine tragedies, but also Cymbeline, Two Noble Kinsmen and Lope's Castelvines y Monteses in comparison to Romeo and Juliet. He reveals the playwright anticipated and depended on spectator reactions.
This is a revealing book bred of decades especially in the Berkeley and California Theater scene, but also of course as an advocate and participant in the reconstruction of Shakespeare's Globe in London. Richmond finds Shakespeare in harmony with Lope's idea of "the tragic mixed with the comic...one part grave, the other absurd": not exactly the genre of "tragicomedy" advocated by Fletcher, but perhaps tragedies which end happily, like Richard III or even MacBeth.
HR argues Shakespeare's tragedies are "governed primariy by what audiences welcome, not by respect for the criteria of authorities such as Sidney…" "The plays' structures, characterization, tone and emotional impact are governed primarily by recurring responses to performances from their popular audiences"(8) ( )