"Hadfield's The English Renaissance 1500-1620 admirably acheives the author's intention, clearly set out in a preamble, to provide essentials to readers new to the territory. It is divided into helpful sections, providing a succint historical overview of the period and of major religious, political, exploratory and colonising movements. And it is written in lucid, jargon-free prose. Hadfield's book is a leader in its field." Times Higher Education Supplement "This guide will be useful precisely because it is a supplement to (and not a substitute for) the primary materials from the period. It self-consciously raises the proper questions not only for the authors and texts it includes, but also for the very process involved in making those selections. As such, it is a guide that can lead undergraduate students profitably through the Dark Wood of English Renaissance literature, as well as the critical debates generated by the literature." Reference Reviews "Andrew Hadfield's The English Renaissance, 1500-1620 in the series Blackwell Guides to Literature - lucid little introductions to issues, authors, and texts, aimed at the undergraduate but also useful for Ph.D. students - is remarkable because he wrote it all himself." Studies in English Literature "What makes these pieces particularly useful in one's teaching is that they are short but also insightful and provocative. They therefore manage to be accessible to students and to exemplify the kind of work that one would seriously expect one's students to aspire to. ... The English Renaissance 1500-1620 is an informative work and an engaging read. I hope that it will be appearing under the heading of required secondary reading in undergraduate module and course guides for many years to come." English: The Journal of the English Association