The 'Sound of Shakespeare' reveals the surprising extent to which Shakespeare's art is informed by the various attitudes, beliefs, practices and discourses that pertained to sound and hearing in his culture. In this engaging study, Wes Folkerth develops listening as a critical practice, attending to the ways in which Shakespeare's plays express their author's awareness of early modern associations between sound and particular forms of ethical and aesthetic experience. Through readings of the acoustic representation of deep subjectivity in , of the 'public ear' in , the receptive ear in , the grotesque ear in , the 'greedy ear' in , and the 'willing ear' in , Folkerth demonstrates that by listening to Shakespeare himself listening, we derive a fuller understanding of why his works continue to resonate so strongly with is today.