The Gospel according to Shakespeare

"This is a passionate and insightful reading of Shakespeare's late plays, beginning with Hamlet and culminating with The Tempest, by one of Italy's leading literary scholars. Rather than engaging in extended critical debate with either prior theological visitors to Shakespeare or with the contemporary secular hegemony, Boitani embarks on a more personal and intimate reading of the plays that includes extensive retelling of their basic narratives with an eye to disclosing their gospel themes of love, hope, faith, charity, and rebirth. What makes the book distinctive is the voice of the author and the 'lectura' mode, which will garner a different, broader audience for this book than that achieved by scholars working similar terrain in a more academic mode." —Julia Lupton, author of Thinking with Shakespeare: Essays on Politics and Life

"This brilliant beautiful book unfolds the unique theological vision of Shakespeare's late plays. The gospel according to Shakespeare, the "good news" is immanent: on earth, in historical time, and achieved through the recognition of love. Boitani's vision weaves Shakespeare's imagery among the plays, the Bible, and the classics, producing a reading experience of such plenitude that it is akin to the world he describes." —Regina Schwartz, Northwestern University

"Boitani engages readers as though they were listening to a professor’s lecture. Always keeping in mind his audience, his style proves that one doesn’t need a master’s degree in theology to appreciate the similarities he draws between Shakespeare and the gospels." —U.S. Catholic Magazine

"This English translation of the 2009 Italian edition broadens Boitani's examination of the Christian themes found in Shakespeare's later work. . . . This book is intended for a general audience and includes thorough plot summaries and many quotations from the plays. However, it is not an introductory text. Boitani's study will be appreciated most by readers who are already familiar with the work discussed here." —Library Journal

"This charming translation from the Italian edition . . . is an elegant, unabashed case for the overtly Christian elements of the plays, culminating in the argument that from Hamlet forward, Shakespeare consciously sought to develop his own gospel, using the Bible as 'signpost.' Highly recommended." —Choice

"Piero Boitani, a professor of comparative literature who has written books on the Bible, Homer, Dante, Boccaccio and Chaucer, wants to persuade us that, from Hamlet's return in the fifth act through King Lear to the four Romances, Shakespeare was 'engaged in developing his own Gospel,' parallel to the Gospels of the New Testament, but proposing a redemption that is this-worldly, however mysterious, and has to do with love, forgiveness and reconciliation." —The Times Literary Supplement

“A short and intriguing book, Piero Boitani’s The Gospel According to Shakespeare is written by a major scholar for everybody: for scholars, for non-scholars, for us all. . . . There really is a ‘Gospel according to Shakespeare’ in these six plays, and Boitani explains it with clarity and elegance.” —America

"In this wonderful, cultivated, even wise treatment of Shakespearean allusion to the Bible, Boitani retells the stories of six plays, commenting upon their gospel verbal echoes to show us a Shakespeare who, whatever his actual beliefs, casts his human actions with a divine, distinctly Christian light." —Sixteenth Century Journal

“Sprinkled bountifully with terminology grounded in the conventions of classical rhetoric, Boitani’s book also ably demonstrates his knowledge of literary traditions and meaningful interpretive analysis, coupled with keenly observed overt and embedded scriptural references throughout the plays.” —Catholic Library World

“In The Gospel According to Shakespeare, Piero Boitani offers a close critical look at William Shakespeare’s ‘re-scripturing’ of the Gospels in his work. For Boitani, Shakespeare’s works are a meditation ‘on providence, on forgiveness, and on goodness and happiness’ and this is achieved ‘in Christian terms'. . . Boitani argues that Shakespeare, particularly in his plays after Hamlet, is engaged in creating his own Gospel.” —Parergon

“A singular act of appreciation and testimony by a great scholar with a pan-European grasp of literary and scriptural traditions.” —Studies in English Literature