Timon of Athens

The New Oxford Shakespeare
The New Oxford Shakespeare offers authoritative editions of Shakespeare’s works with introductory materials designed to encourage new interpretations of the plays and poems.
‘The moon’s an arrant thief,And her pale fire she snatches from the sun.’How should society treat its bankrupts? What are the ethics of debt collection? What does it mean to be rich, to be poor? And can you ever really buy friendship? In Timon of Athens, Shakespeare and Middleton pose these and other questions as they chart the dramatic downfall of an Athenian nobleman, exposing the corrosive effects of money and status. At once a critique of wealth inequality and a meditation on the fragility of human bonds, the play presents Timon as one of the playwright’s most puzzling and enigmatic creations. In her introduction, Sophie Battell connects early modern debates on usury to the continuing reverberations of the recent financial crisis and gl