"Before her death in September 2001, Susan Snyder collected a number of her essays that she felt represented some of her best work in Shakespearean criticism over a period of about three decades. Many of them were written for specific occasions or specific reasons having to do with teaching or with panel discussions before diverse audiences, which she entered into along with others.

In the process she contributed some of the best work on Shakespeare that was then extant, as this collection demonstrates." "Searching for a principle of organization, Professor Snyder decided that it would be best to arrange the essays in chronological order. The result was a kind of "intellectual autobiography," as she calls it in her Preface, and the title she chose was Shakespeare: A Wayward Journey, since it reflects her travels over the various avenues of Shakespearean criticism."--BOOK JACKET.