These thirty essays reflect contemporary interest in poetic language, the aesthetics of drama, the Elizabethan theater, and Renaissance modes of thought. The selections provide an excellent sampling of both contrasting and complementary viewpoints and have been drawn from the work of such distinguished modern critics as H. Granville-Barker, Northrop Frye, L.L. Barber, Robert Ornstein, Mark Van Doren, and Reuben Brower.