The vitality of our culture is still often measured by the status Shakespeare has within it. Contemporary readers and writers continue to exploit Shakespeare's cultural afterlife in a vivid and creative way. This fascinating collection of original essays shows how writers' efforts to intimate, contradict, compete with, and reproduce Shakespeare keep him in the cultural conversation. The contributors analyse the methods and motives of Shakespearean appropriation by looking at a wide range of works and people including: Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley Mama Day by Gloria Naylor Robert Browning the Disney films The Little Mermaid and The Lion King Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch James Andreas, Caroline Cakebread, Richard Finkelstein, Terence Hawkes, Ivo Kamps, Matt Kozusko, Laurie Osborne, Robert Sawyer, Jyotsna Singh, Lisa S. Starks, Georgianna Ziegler.