This is a superb book in every way: fine scholarship, painstaking reproduction, beautiful presentation. Nothing else is in the class of the Norton First Folio facsimile. To those who may look askance at the price, I can only say the book is worth every penny. What Heminge and Condell said in "To the great Variety of Readers" about the original Folio is equally applicable to this reproduction: "Iudge your sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue shillings worth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, and welcome. But, what euer you do, Buy."

This is one of the funniest plays that i have ever read. I am a theatre major and have to read TONS of plays and i love this one. The writing was made to be directed. And i also love this play as a director because it is like doing a Shakespeare without putting your actors through that language! It's a must read for Shakespeare fans!

For my money this is one of the best books of Shakesperean study that I have read. It is even better than John Dover Wilson's "What Happens In Hamlet", yet another classic. A book you must have if you are really into Shakespeare.

This book contains the four "best" comedies of Shakespeare, along with an excellent foreword by Joseph Papp. For each play, it contains a very well written introduction (one that is not only on the play, but links each of them together), Shakespeare's original source material (example: "A Merry Jest of a Shrewd and Curst Wife Lapped in Morel's Skin" for "the Taming of the Shrew"), and well commented textual notes. I found this collection particularly useful for an "upper-level" look at these four plays.

Very classic, humourous veiw of shakespeare

It is difficult to know how "generosity" might better be investigated as a critical bellwether than by this most generous of thinkers, William Flesch, whose expansive intellect readily welcomes disparate poetical figures to a "fire-warm'd lodge" of his own making. Occupying a paradigmatic position vis-a-vis hedonism, Flesch challenges the privileged space of Western intellectual practice in denying the figure of the sucking vortex the power of his critical imprimatur. My friend recommended this book to me, and although I was skeptical, since, being a "science" man, I don't read much literary criticism, I thought *The Heart of Generosity* was really readable. The power of Flesch's overwhelming images and amazing insights into a wide variety of interesting topics mesmerized me, as it did my friends and colleagues at work.

The "Hamlet" that Edward Gordon Craig directed in tandem with Konstantin Stanislavsky at the Moscow Art Theatre has taken on mythic status in theatre studies in the West.
In this fascinating study, Laurence Senelick shows what went into the making of this event. The author makes extensive use of various previously untapped Russian sources and reveals the conflicts, both personal and artistic, underlying the mixed succes of this epoch-making production. The goings-on behind the scenes turn out to be at least as dramatic as the action on stage! Especially the story of Craig's assistant and interpreter Suler(zhitsky) is very poinant. The book provides a very detailed description of the eventual production with the famous screens and describes its impact.
In his "Hamlet", Gordon Craig aimed to create a highly personal, almost hermetic symbolist drama. Stanislavski directed the actors on the basis of what he believed Craig's wishes to be -- and this at a time when he was still feeling his way towards his "method", which was much more naturalistic. Perhaps their approaches could never be reconciled, but at least they made this valiant attempt...
Subsequently, both men proved to be seminal forces in 20th century theatre: Craig became the prophet of the director as the pivotal figure in stage production, three-dimensional and abstract set design, and proper stage lighting (instead of shadows painted on canvas backdrops). He also helped to get theatre history off the ground as a respectable occupation. Stanislavsky needs no introduction, of course.
This study is essential reading for anyone interested in the grass roots of 20th century theatre. Moreover, this is no dessicated academic study. In places, it's as entertaining as a Robertson Davies novel.

I am reviewing N. F. Blake's "A Grammar of Shakespeare's Language"

This is the best book about Shakespeare's art in quite a long time. It is so because it focuses on the grammatical norms of Shakespeare's English.

This is a book that adds to our understanding of Shakespeare because it describes in great detail the syntax of the English of Shakespeare's plays and poems. This grammar uses terms from traditional grammar like adjective and adverb, and it also uses terms from functional grammar such as "noun head," "do-periphrasis," and "discourse analysis." A familiarity with the grammars of Quirk, Greenbaum, Svartvik and Leech is not essential but will make Blake's grammar easier to read.

Blake uses the Norton Facsimile (second editition), the Allen and Muir edition of Shakepeare's quarto facsimilies, and 19th Century facsimiles as his sources. It is a bold choice to do so because he wants to demonstrate the features of Shakepeare's grammar with a minimum of editorial interference. But then Blake ties his citations to the line numbering from the Oxford edition because he says this edition was more accessable to the ordinary reader. I confess that I do not find the choice convienent. I would have preferred that he cited the sources that he used directly because it would have been easier to verify his conclusions.

It should be stressed that this book limits itself to the syntax and usage found in Shakespeare plays and poems. It is not a comprehensive grammar of Early Modern English. There are features which show up in Early Modern English which do not show up in Shakespeare's writings. For example, on page 208 Blake writes that "In ShE "not" is never abbrivated to "n't"....which sets it apart from PdE where forms like "don't" are common." "N't" is found in Early Modern English. Though it is true that Shakespeare did not use contractions like "won't," his contempory Thomas Middleton did. See "The Family of Love" (1607) act iv, scene iv, line 49. Gudgeon says to Purge "A pile on ye, won't you! had you not been so manable, here are some would have saved you that labour."

The word "don't" does appear in the 1623 folio, but not as a contraction of "do not" but as a contraction of "done it." See Macbeth act 2, scene 2, line 13 (Norton2 p. 744 col. 2)

But these are minor criticisms. This grammar is authoritative. Shakespeare's readers at all levels will find many things to interest them.

One of the major problems with sound recordings of plays isthat of making stage actions clear when the lines are of no help. WhenCyrano tells Christian to "climb" up to the arms of Roxane, we can assume he does so and a few discreet grunts would help. But when Hamlet stages a dumb show for Claudius and all the court, different directors of recorded versions treat the problem differently.

One or two recordings leave it out and skip directly to the spoken "Mouse Trap," while at least one I have heard has some music playing and the court reacting audibly to whatever is supposed to be happening. Well, I was most impressed in the Arkangel audio edition of when Shakespeare's stage directions concerning the dumb show were read by Hamlet as dialogue. This works just fine and I cannot conceive any future recording doing it any other way. The exchange of rapiers during the duel, however, is not at all clear without having a text open before you. (In the Branagh recording, a line is inserted to tell us the weapons are switched.)

The intelligence with which that dumb show is handled made me very favorably disposed to this set that is cast strongly with Jane Lapotaire (Gertrude), Imogene Stubbs (Ophelia), Bob Peck (Claudius), and Norman Rodway (Polonius). However (oh, dear), when it comes to the Hamlet of Simon Russell Beale, I must back off just a little.

I find his reading much better than the dry recital of Paul Scofield on the Harper Audio version, less flexible than Brannagh's on the Bantam set, and far less poetical than Gielgud on the long out of print RCA Victor version from the 1950s. Whether by personal choice or director's mandate, this is somewhat monochromatic Hamlet: angry and intense. Too many of his lines are read between strong inhalations, as if he is trying to cope with his emotions--which indeed Hamlet is. Towards the end of the play, he seems to loosen up and actually manages a vocal smile as he tells Horatio about how he forged the letter that sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to their deaths.Do not missunderstand! What he does he does very well. My point is that he does not explore all the facets of the character as well as some of the rival Hamlets.

Although timed at 3 hours, 25 minutes, the entire play is on two cassettes (as opposed to the four for the Scofield version and for the Branagh) and modestly priced. So despite my minor reservations, this is for me the "Hamlet" of choice.

I recently read the book Hamlet by William Shakespeare and I loved it. It contains all of the characteristics needed for a good story Such as murder, revenge, friendship, trust, life, and death. Hamlet also expresses how many different emotions people can have such as love, hate, anger, sadness, and much more. This story shows how important family and love are.
In Hamlet a young boy, named Hamlet finds out that his father, the king, was murdered in his sleep and the king's brother wants to marry the queen. Soon after the wedding Hamlet is visited by the ghost of his dad. The ghost tells him that his brother, now the king, is the one that killed him with help from the queen. The ghost asks hamlet to avenge his death by killing the new king. Through most of the play hamlet has to decide what to believe. While he is doing that his girlfriend thinks he is going crazy because he has been acting so strangely. All of the other people in the castle also start to believe that he is insane.
Is the middle of the play Hamlet says the most famous lines ever written and most people have probably heard them somewhere. What he says is, "To be or not to be, that is the question, for is it nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortune of to take arms against the sea of troubles in by opposing in them. To die, to sleep, no more." Hamlet is the longest play ever written but it is very good. Without all of the things in it the story would not be so interesting.
I am sure you probably have many questions about the book. To find out how the story ends you will just have to read the book. I am sure you wont be disappointed.