The Fifth World Shakespeare Congress, held in Tokyo in August 1991, attracted seven hundred Shakespeareans from thirty-five countries. Those contributing to the program included some of the best-known critics and scholars working today in the field of Shakespeare studies. A selection of the many stimulating papers given during the congress is presented here in Shakespeare and Cultural Traditions.

This theme of Shakespeare and cultural traditions was explored from many angles: the cultural forces that helped shape Shakespeare's work in his own time: the assimilation of Shakespeare by other cultures through translation and theatre performances: the creative influence of the plays on other cultural media such as opera and film: and interpretations of Shakespeare from late-twentieth-century viewpoints including the psychoanalytical, the political, the feminist, and the new historical.

The lectures delivered by the four plenary speakers of the congress are published here: Stephen Greenblatt's groundbreaking paper on witchcraft and Macbeth: Germaine Greer's perceptive analysis of the presence of the proletariat in Shakespeare's plays: Ruth Nevo's intriguing exploration of Freudian perspectives on Hamlet; and Takashi Sasayama's important comparative study of tragedy and emotion in Shakespeare and Chikamatsu.

This volume also includes papers by other Shakespearean scholars of international reputation, offering fresh insights into many topics of interest. Among them are John Russell Brown on "Shakespeare's Plays and Traditions of Playgoing"; Sukanta Chaudhuri on "Shakespeare and the Ethnic Question"; Werner Habicht on the German Shakespeare tradition; Alexander Leggatt on bearbaiting; Avraham Oz on The Merchant of Venice; Annabel Patterson and Taming of the Shrew; and Gary Taylor on "Bardicide."

1. Taken together, the essays collected in Shakespeare and Cultural Traditions constitute a remarkable range of responses to Shakespeare's enduring art and offer a truly international and multicultural assessment of his presence in the world today.