Instructor: Michael Cooley

No image available Biography: Michael E. Cooley is a retired professor. He taught courses on Shakespeare for 20 years, various writing genres (creative, analytical/argumentative, advanced essay) for 33 years, as well as interdisciplinary honors courses. Michael taught at the University of Georgia, University of Louisville, Emporia State University and Berry College. He works to involve class members in active engagement with course content, to enjoy and celebrate the many pleasures of learning and to discuss the ways literature and art enliven the experience of life.

Classes by this instructor


Shakespeare wrote plays to entertain the contemporaries of his time - audiences who shared a common set of cultural values and knowledge, which are embedded in the text of his plays. To see his plays, one had to go to the theatre, watch, listen and participate in the drama before them. Four hundred years later, we live in a radically different culture. To enjoy and be "entertained" by Shakespeare's plays, a few of those Elizabethan norms are integral to understand. Key cultural elements of plays will be presented in brief lectures, which will allow shared cultural concepts to be "seen" more easily within the plays. This, in turn, should allow the plays to be more engaging, as they were to Shakespeare's original audience. As time and energy allow, most of the class discussion will be based upon a close reading of, talking about and enjoying "Hamlet." Prepare to be entertained and enlivened by Shakespeare's art and insights into his world as well as our own.


Instructor Bio: Michael E. Cooley is a retired professor. He taught courses on Shakespeare for 20 years, various writing genres (creative, analytical/argumentative, advanced essay) for 33 years, as well as interdisciplinary honors courses. Michael taught at the University of Georgia, University of Louisville, Emporia State University and Berry College. He works to involve class members in active engagement with course content, to enjoy and celebrate the many pleasures of learning and to discuss the ways literature and art enliven the experience of life.


March 3-24, 2026, St Andrews Classroom