"Barbara J. Shapiro's Political Communication and Political Culture in England, 1558-1688 represents an ambitious synthesis, the work of a senior scholar bringing together diverse strands of scholarship and primary source research. While not a research monograph in the traditional sense, the book succeeds in introducing a broad range of concerns associated with the study of the media in early modern England . This is an excellent book for undergraduate and graduate students new to the field of early modern British history and for younger scholars looking for a broad overview of the various modes of political communication at work in early modern English political life, whether, print, script, ritual, performance, or the spoken word."--D. Alan Orr, Journal of British Studies (pre-1800).