Through a close reading of five key plays (Romeo and Juliet, 1595/6; Twelfth Night, 1600/1; Othello, 1604/5; The Winter's Tale, 1610/1, The Tempest, 1611) students will explore Shakespeare’s relationship with dramatic form, learning to identify the foundations and evolution of the Shakespearean tragedy, comedy (and dark comedy), as well as his experimentation with form in his late plays. Each play will be introduced and contextualized through pointed lectures, and then discussed in detail in a Socratic seminar. The plays span the arc of Shakespeare’s career and offer precious insights into the evolution of Shakespeare’s conceptualization of theater, the human experience, and the potential for art to subvert human shortcomings. The explicit Italian setting in four of the plays will enrich the students' understanding of Italy as an imaginary landscape; this will be complemented nicely by the implicit allusions to Italy in the other two plays. A selection of short critical readings will complement the students' understanding of the plays and of the principles of dramatic form.