Compiled by one of the best-known authorities on the Bard's works, this dictionary offers up-to-date information on all aspects of Shakespeare in his own time and on his impact and influence on later ages. It includes entries on the plays and the major characters, on Shakespeare's life and his contemporaries, on actors from Edmund Kean to Peter O'Toole, on theatres and directors, plus comments on Shakespeare by later authors such as Jane Austen, Dr Johnson, and Bernard Levin.

By Kirsten Olsen. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2002.

Naseeb Shaheen. Newark: University of Delaware; London; Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Presses, c1999.

By Evangeline M. O'Connor ; with a foreword by Alice Sachs. New York: Avenel Books: distributed by Crown Publishers, c1978.

By Stanley Wells and Gary Taylor, with John Jowett, and William Montgomery. Oxford [Oxfordshire] : Clarendon Press ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1987.

By David M. Bergeron & Geraldo U. de Sousa. 3rd ed., rev. Lawrence : University Press of Kansas, c1995.

J. Madison Davis, A. Daniel Frankforter. New York : Garland, c1995.

Eugene F. Shewmaker. New York : Facts On File, c1996.

By Gilian West. Lewiston, NY : E. Mellen Press, 1998.

A great source.Indexes are especially good: you can look up a theme, a motif, to learn where it's been treated in relation to a play, character, etc. Or, you can begin with a play, a specific character, and see the connections with theme and/or motif. Articles/essays (written by noteworthy, even famous critics/ contemporaries) are arranged in chronological order revealing trends in criticism over the life of the author/work. Full text.