The four actors whose careers the essays in this volume explore are not only the greatest English actors of their own times but also performers whose brilliance is still invoked by all interested in theatre. Each took a distinct approach to the Shakespeare roles they played and the texts they used: from David Garrick's ability to move other actors as well as the audience to tears, to the noble classicism of John Philip Kemble, from the grand tragic style of Sarah Siddons to the terrifying energy of Edmund Kean. Each changed forever the concept of what Shakespeare's plays might mean in performance.

Series Preface - Peter Holland and Adrian Poole
Introduction, Peter Holland (Notre Dame, USA)
David Garrick, Peter Holland (Notre Dame, USA)
John Philip Kemble, Michael Dobson (Birkbeck, UK)
Sarah Siddons, Russ McDonald (Goldsmiths, UK)
Edmund Kean, Peter Thomson (Exeter, UK)
Index

Peter Holland holds the McMeel Family Chair in Shakespeare Studies in the Department of Film, Television and Theatre and is Associate Dean for the Arts at the University of Notre Dame, USA. He has served as the Director of the Shakespeare Institute at Stratford-upon-Avon and is editor of Shakespeare Survey and General Editor (with Stanley Wells) of Oxford Shakespeare Topics.
Contributors: Michael Dobson (University of Birmingham, UK), Peter Holland (University of Notre Dame, USA), Russ McDonald (Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK) and Peter Thomson (University of Exeter, UK).