Metaphysics is usually associated with that part of the philosophical tradition which asks about 'last things', questions such as: How many substances are there in the world? Which is more fundamental, quantity or quality? Are events prior to things, or do they happen to those things? While he wasn't a philosopher, Shakespeare was obviously interested in 'ultimates' of this sort. Instead of probing these issues with argument, however, he did so with plays. Shakespearean Metaphysics argues for Shakespeare's inclusion within a metaphysical tradition that opposes empiricism and Cartesian dualism. Through close readings of three major plays - The Tempest, King Lear and Twelfth Night - Witmore proposes that Shakespeare's manner of depicting life on stage itself constitutes an 'answer' to metaphysical questions raised by later thinkers as Spinoza, Bergson, and Whitehead. Each of these readings shifts the interpretative frame around the plays in radical ways; taken together they show the limits of our understanding of theatrical play as an 'illusion' generated by the physical circumstances of production. 'Foregrounding dramaturgy (the staging of bodies, audience, the materiality of performance) in "Twelfth Night", "King Lear", and "The Tempest "rather than ideas voiced in speeches, and deploying a different philosopher Whitehead, Bergson, Spinoza for each play, Witmore builds a compelling vision of Shakespeare as a metaphysician of immanence...Lucid and original.' - Brian Rotman, Professor, Department of Comparative Studies, Ohio State University, USA Mention Book News, February 2009 'Witmore's literary analyses of the plays' dramatic details are generally excellent...and his prose in most explications is supple, lucid, and often nicely poetic.'--English Studies, Vol 91, No 6 Mention --Book News, February 2009 Mention -Book News, February 2009 Reviewed in Routledge ABES Michael Witmore is Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC, USA. His book, Culture of Accidents: Unexpected Knowledges in Early Modern England (Stanford, 2001) was the co-winner of the Perkins Prize for the Study of Narrative Literature in 2003. He is also the author of Pretty Creatures: Children and Fiction in the English Renaissance (Cornell, 2007) Ewan Fernie is Chair, Professor and Fellow at The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham, UK. His latest book, The Demonic: Literature and Experience , gives considerable attention to Shakespeare and Mann. Simon Palfrey is a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford University. His books include Late Shakespeare: A New World of Words (Oxford, 1997); Shakespeare in Parts (Oxford, 2007), written with Tiffany Stern and awarded the Medieval and Renaissance Drama Society's David Bevington Prize for best new book; Romeo and Juliet (Short Books, 2011); and the novel Dunsinane , written with Ewan Fernie. He is the founding editor (with Fernie) of Continuum's innovative series of 'minigraphs', Shakespeare Now! His new work includes a book on possible worlds in early modern drama and philosophy, and a play inspired by Spenser's Faerie Queen . His book Doing Shakespeare was published by Arden Shakespeare in 2005, reissued 2011.