‘… this fascinating volume tease[s] out the complex array of connections between “lying” and “truth” in Shakespeare's writing. The two terms emerge here not as straightforward binary opposites, but as shifting, mutually implicated nodes within larger webs of religious, political, and philosophical discourse. To “lie like the truth” is not just a dark art practised by the Witches of Macbeth; it is a pervasive skill in early modern English cultural production, from the sprezzatura of the courtier and the rhetoric of the grammar schoolboy to the fabulation of the poet and the imposture of the actor. With these eleven essays, Shakespeare's plays and poems emerge as laboratories within which the art of ‘lying like the truth’ is repeatedly scrutinised, tested, unravelled, and re-assembled.’
Jonathan Gil Harris, Professor of English, George Washington University, USA, and Associate Editor, Shakespeare Quarterly
‘This outstanding collection … from an international group of scholars is admirable for delivering both focus and range. On the one hand, it is tightly and rigorously organised around the theme of lying, dissimulation, and ‘lying like truth’ in Shakespeare, so that readers will experience the pleasure of working through a problem. At the same time, extending its reach to other early modern writers such as Montaigne, Machiavelli, and Castiglione, it explores the issue of “lying” in relationship to physiognomy, skepticism, gender, ethics, politics, painting, poststructuralism, and literary theory.’
Robert Henke, Professor of Drama and Comparative Literature, Washington University, USA