Son tan innumerables las páginas escritas sobre Shakespeare que parecía imposible añadir alguna novedad, y aún más difícil expresar la conmoción que suscitan sus obras en la propia experiencia. Jan Kott mostro con este libro -cuya primera edicion data de 1964- a un Shakespeare que -con el trasfondo de las disputas monarquicas y sus recursos al terror y el asesinato para asegurar el poder-, revela el mecanismo sangriento de la Historia, las violentas discrepancias ideologicas y la destruccion que ha configurado la Europa del siglo XX. En "hakespeare, nuestro contemporaneo"la caracterizacion humana de sus personajes adquiere la inmediatez de la convulsion historica.
Shakespeare, Our Contemporary is a provocative, original study of the major plays of Shakespeare. More than that, it is one of the few critical works to have strongly influenced theatrical productions.Peter Brook and Charles Marowitz are among the many directors who have acknowledged their debt to Jan Kott, finding in his analogies between Shakespearean situations and those in modern life and drama the seeds of vital new stage conceptions. Shakespeare, Our Contemporary has been translated into nineteen languages since it appeared in 1961, and readers all over the world have similarly found their responses to Shakespeare broadened and enriched.