For decades, people have been studying Shakespeare's life and times and in recent years there has been a renewed surge of interest in aspects of his language. So how can we better understand Shakespeare? David Crystal provides a lively and original introduction to Shakespeare's language, making his plays easily accessible to modern-day audiences. Covering the five main dimensions of language structure - writing system, pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary and conversational style - this book demonstrates how examining these linguistic 'nuts and bolts' can help us achieve a greater appreciation of Shakespeare's linguistic creativity.

Explains clearly the terms required to understand Shakespeare's language, assuming no prior specialist knowledge
Includes many examples from Shakespeare's plays and poems, providing essential context for the reader
Contains a lively and original A-Z Appendix of Shakespeare's 'false friends' - words which seem familiar to us today, but in fact have a completely different meaning