Shakespeare in America

MISS DUNN has the ingenious idea of applying the use of Shakespeare as a sort of thermometer for the cultural climate of America in various times and regions. This idea and the research involved in carrying it out make the book well worth reading in spite of its annoying defects — unwarranted assumptions about Shakespeare, often set forth in a forlorn kind of English. How is it, one wonders afresh, that so many American professors of English seem to know almost everything about the English language except what to do with it?