Tony (A. D.) Nuttall, former Professor of English at Oxford University, died suddenly in January at the age of 69, before his magnum opus, Shakespeare: The Thinker (Yale, £19.99), could be published.
In this posthumous work, he tackles the great themes found in the plays - motive, morality, personal identity and relationships - in an accessible way, but with the mind of a philosopher.
However, he acknowledges that Shakespeare was a playwright and poet, not a systematic philosopher. Although he grappled with problems that continue to perplex great thinkers, if there was a choice between the world of emotion, and the world of thought, then Shakespeare was surely a 'feeler' rather than a 'thinker'.
Nuttall brings into his arguments not just Kierkegaard and Karl Popper, but also Ian McEwan's novel Atonement and the arguments over invading Iraq. As in Shakespeare's work, there is something here for everyone.
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