Of his time: Shakespeare's concerns don't always coincide with ours

Maguire critiques The Invention of Shakespeare: And Other Essays by Stephen Orgel and Shakespeare and Textual Theory by Suzanne Gossett. Orgel is interested in books: continental books, illustrated books, Caxton's books, editors'creation of books. He is also interested in plays: Edward Gordon Craig's collaboration with Stanislavsky, contemporary Shakespeare performance in Italy and Santa Cruz, early-modern audience responses to Romeo and Juliet, King Lear and Othello. But throughout The Invention of Shakespeare, Orgel is adamant that a/the book is not the play. Meanwhile, Orgel writes with elegant common sense, though, as he acknowledges, common sense is "culturally specific". He biopsies culturally specific moments, from sixteenth-century audience responses to editorial assumptions, approaching them, initially, through performance: "tastes change, and theater is the great barometer of taste".