Pt. 1:Shakespeare and comic tradition --Theories of comedy /David Galbraith --Roman comedy /Robert S. Miola --Italian stories on the stage /Louise George Clubb --Elizabethan comedy /Janette Dillon --Popular festivity /François Laroque --pt. 2:Shakespearean comedy --Forms of confusion /John Creaser --Love and courtship /Catherine Bates --Laughing at "others" /Edward Berry --Comedy and sex /Alexander Leggatt --Language and comedy /Lynne Magnusson --Sexual disguise and the theatre of gender /Barbara Hodgdon --Matters of state /Anthony Miller --The experiment of romance /Michael O'Connell.