Cicely Berry, Voice Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, is world-famous for her voice teaching. The Actor and the Text is her classic book, distilled from years of working with actors of the highest calibre.

Building on the specific exercises covered in her first book, Voice and the Actor, Cicely Berry relates the practicality of voice production to the challenges of a different text. And by getting inside the words we use - whether those of Shakespeare or our contemporaries - she shows how to release their energy and excitement for an audience.