ABSTRACT
This volume has focused on three things: transgression, transmission, initiation. In its Afterword, I want to consider one of those instances, central to Shakespeare, where in the aesthetic immediacy of an exciting play transgression is instantly and efficiently communicated to the audience. It is transmitted so effectively because transgression substantially is the entertainment at this point. Its power is indistinguishable from the fascinating power of the play itself, which involves the audience sharing in the transgression to the extent of unsettling and perhaps guilty participation.
