Teacher educators have come to appreciate that the teaching of difficult subjects combines knowledge of content and knowledge of generic teaching methods. A study was conducted, therefore, to explore the potential of cases to carry pedagogical content knowledge. A case was developed describing how an expert teacher goes about teaching "Hamlet" to diverse high school students. The case was taught to two groups of methods students (N=35) enrolled in a graduate level certification program. Originally, data indicated that the study was a failure. Many students were unenthusiastic about studying Shakespeare in a methods course. But further data analysis indicated significant development in education students' understanding of students' problems in reading Shakespeare and of purposes and issues in teaching a literary classic. Most students transferred their understandings to the teaching of other literary classics. The results also suggest that students need prior subject background to benefit from cases of pedagogical content knowledge. This case was developed in serial form. The classic Part A--Problem; Part B--Appraisal format of the Harvard Business School cases is appended. (LL)