Customer Reviews

Ophelia

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Lisa Klein's Ophelia is a tightly-written, pacey and lively spin-off of Hamlet in novel form, as told from (you guessed it) Ophelia's perspective. The plot begins years before Hamlet's timeline and ends years after, allowing for Ophelia's character to be drawn out much more fully from Shakespeare's sketchy and puzzling portrayal.

Klein chose to set the novel not in the period of Hamlet's Denmark, but in the period of Shakespeare's writing of the play. Interwoven with the plot of Hamlet are allusions to a number of contemporary works, including Romeo and Juliet and As You Like It, in addition to conceits from sonnets by (among others) Lady Mary Wroth, all against a backdrop of romance, conduct literature, hagiography and other genres for and about women.

The fact that Ophelia is a woman allows Klein to intersperse a range of historical detail appopriate to women, including negotiations with cultural requirements for chastity, obedience and silence and a rich tapestry of herbal lore (as suggested by Ophelia's preoccupation with flowers in Hamlet). The characters' language is also suggestive of early modern literary dialogue.

However, these scholarly elements are by no means overpowering: the novel walks a careful line, never losing track that it is first and foremost a modern romance intended for the enjoyment of a wide readership without specialist knowledge. Whether intentional or not, it's a story that's crying out for a film.

I have read Hamlet. Yes, and I think Ophelia deserved better. Her husband mad, her life shattered -- kind of tragic, don't you think, after she died.

Ophelia provides a new story. Ophelia really didn't die. She faked her death and ran off to the convent of St. Emilion. And yes, she finds new love. :) Yay!

Ophelia is one of those stories I could read again and again and again! I feel like I know Hamlet, Horatio, Ophelia, Laertes, and Elnora. I realize how suffocating Elsinore Castle was. It makes me want to dig up Shakespearian tales and say, "What were you thinking? Ophelia is MUCH cooler than this!". Although not perfect, it's a great read.

Ophelia is born in the year 1585 in the village of Elsinore. Her mother dies giving birth, and her father is distant and aloof, oftentimes absent from their home for days while seeking employment in the king's court. So Ophelia's older brother becomes her playmate and protector. They swim in the river, explore in the forest and run wild in the streets with other children. Their father does hire a tutor for Ophelia's brother, and though girls at this time usually are not educated, he gives his permission for Ophelia to learn as well, just to keep her out of trouble.

But life changes drastically when Ophelia turns eight. Her father finally gets a job working for King Hamlet, and the three of them move to Elsinore Castle.

Living at the Castle is so very different from their old life in the village. The castle is dark and drafty, yet filled with beautiful furniture and rugs, delicious food and drink, and people dressed in fancy clothes. Ophelia and her brother soon meet the king and queen at a banquet, along with their son, Prince Hamlet. Being around the same age, Ophelia's brother and the likable prince often engage in wrestling, archery and sword dueling. Hamlet even takes the time to tease starry-eyed Ophelia.

As Ophelia gets a little older, the queen takes notice and invites Ophelia to join her ladies-in-waiting. There Ophelia finally receives a bit of female guidance and learns to be a "proper lady." Ophelia could do without the endless hours of sewing, but she loves having access to books. In fact, when the queen finds out how well educated Ophelia is, she becomes one of the queen's favorites, spending hours reading aloud and sharing discussions with the queen.

The queen isn't the only one who notices Ophelia getting older; Prince Hamlet has his eye on her as well. But because she never would be accepted as a suitable match, Hamlet and Ophelia must keep their love a secret. With the help of Hamlet's trusted friend, Horatio, they dress as poor peasants and meet away from the castle in the orchards, gardens and an abandoned cottage. They soon decide to defy traditions and secretly elope.

But before they can gather the courage to announce their elopement, the king is murdered! Overcome with anger and grief, Hamlet becomes totally obsessed with discovering his father's killer and forgets his new bride. Ophelia falls into deep despair. But when the murderer begins to suspect that he or she may be exposed, Ophelia decides that her existence is worth saving and must escape for her very life.

Lisa Klein has done an incredible job with OPHELIA. She has taken one of Shakespeare's famous plays and written a tale that is a little more user friendly in today's world. Placing the story in young Ophelia's point of view will attract the female readers, especially when joining Ophelia in declaring a woman's life in the 1600s to be completely and unfairly ruled by men. Add castles, adventure, romance, murder and fleeing for one's life, and you have an amazing story.

--- Reviewed by Chris Shanley-Dillman, author of FINDING MY LIGHT and THE BLACK

I am a big fan of Hamlet and I have always wondered what the rest of Ophelia's story is. When of saw this reimagining of Hamlet, from Ophelia's prospective, I was wary but interested. Unfortunately, while decently written, the story was just plain boring and at sometimes forced.

The story starts from Ophelia's point of view earlier than the play, back when the court of King Hamlet was a happy place. There is even a brief meeting with Yorick the jester. It seems okay, the author tries to stay true to the writing style of Hamlet but also tries to make it easily readable. This was okay and overall better than trying to mimic Shakespeare. Unfortunately the author forces in famous parts from the original play. She tries to put them in word for word and they seem strange and stilted in with the rest of the story. It is just plain odd.

The back history and Ophelia's life after where the original play ends seem kind of boring. I am sure that the author means Ophelia to seem spirited and rebellious. To me though Ophelia's story seems rather plain; Ophelia takes what seems to me to be a rather typical route of women that were shunned in that time period. There is no stretch of the imagination here. I wonder if that is meant to make the story more realistic or maybe more in keeping with the times? The tragedy of Hamlet is in itself fanciful so I don't understand why you wouldn't stay with that and make Ophelia have a more interesting part in it all.

Despite all the things I didn't like there were some things I did like. I did like that the author stayed true to the major plotline of Hamlet. I liked the glimpse of the court before King Hamlet's death. And, although it was not in keeping with a tragedy, I liked the hopeful ending. Although even this rankled a bit because after having Ophelia rail against the men in her life it seemed odd for the author to hint that Ophelia would feel more complete with the addition of a man to her life. Maybe this was meant to be ironic. It also bothered me that the characters in this book seemed less passionate than in the play; you would think a book would give more license to character development.

All in all this may be a book I could have never really loved no matter who the writer was. It is an almost insurmountable task to fill-out a story written by Shakespeare. I applaud the author for the attempt. I just wish it was a more interesting and more well-written attempt. As it stands this book was okay, but nothing more. I don't think I will read anything more by this author, her writing style definitely didn't grab and take hold of me.
karissabooks.blogspot.com

Lisa Klein has breathed new life into the Hamlet story. She answers some (although not all) of the mysteries in the play, especially those surrounding Ophelia, but goes far beyond.

Klein has taken it upon herself to make up for the Bard's lack of strong female characters by adding dimension to some that appear in the play and creating totally new ones. In this, she succeeds magnificently. Her Ophelia is a revelation, a young woman who is both credible for her time and appealing to modern audiences.

I strongly recommend this for young girls as well as adults who have scratched their heads trying to figure out exactly what happend at Elsinore and why.

Lisa Klein's OPHELIA recreates the Shakespeare classic for young adults, pairing the classic story with contemporary bent and focus on Ophelia, a rowdy, motherless girl waiting to become the queen's lady-in-waiting when she captures the attention of Prince Hamlet. Ultimately she'll have to choose between romance and life itself in this absorbing story that holds none of the confusing language of Shakespeare's original.

A new imagining of Ophelia from Shakespear's Hamlet. Nothing in Klein's book contradicts what goes on in the play. Instead we get to see what happens before and during the play from Ophelia's point of view. The plot devices are familiar to any reader of Shakespear but the girl/woman Ophelia is much deeper and psychologically nuanced than she appears in Shakespear's play.

This is a good read not only for young adults but also for students in high school or college undergrad.

Ophelia has always been my favourite character from all of Shakespeare's works, and so I was pretty damn delighted when I found this book. But after reading it, I don't really think I should've.

*This part may contain spoilers*

There's a lot of good things about 'Ophelia' -- the backdrop of Denmark, the lives and stories of the people she knew (aside from the main characters of the original Hamlet), and especially the creative license the author took when she altered Ophelia's 'suicide'. I really had no problem with any of that, I felt it was something I'd have never thought of.

Now the bad part. Sometimes I felt the book was just overly drawn, especially the last third at St. Emilion. The story just lingered uselessly, and I felt the moral (Ophelia is a strong, independent woman, etc.) came out a bit forced. I was hoping for an open ending, so I could imagine something more fanciful for Ophelia after she escaped Denmark, but sadly, that didn't happen. The worst still, as others have noticed, is how she ended up with Horatio. What a cop out, I say.

*Spoilers end*

But overall, the first two thirds are pretty decent, well worth a read if you don't mind a little tinkering with the original. But a word of advice, just stop before the third half starts, you'll be happy you did.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

This novel a beautiful retelling of Shakespeare's play Hamlet, told from the point of view of Ophelia, the young girl caught up in the intrigue at the Danish court of Elsinore.

In the first part of the book, Klein imagines events before Hamlet begins, telling how Ophelia came to court and how she gained the love of Prince Hamlet. The second part covers the events of Shakespeare's play; however Ophelia is now the main character. The final part tells of what happens after Shakespeare's play ends.

Loving tales of royalty like I do as well as Shakespeare's plays, this novel interested me greatly ever since I first saw the cover. The novel didn't disappoint me, either. Klein is clearly a talented writer, though this is her first published work. Her writing is fluid and full of beautiful metaphors, and Ophelia is an amazingly well-drawn character, complex in all ways. At times, I thought Ophelia to be naive; at other times, I realized how truly clever the girl was. Truly Ophelia is one of the best leading characters that I've read about in a while. The supporting characters, also, are three dimensional, and, from what I can remember, true to Shakespeare.

My favorite thing about the novel, though, was the dialogue. I thought it be to so realistic, meaning what would have been spoken in the the early seventeenth century. Proper and lyrical. In recreating a time over four hundred years ago, Klein excels.

Unless you absolutely cannot bear to read a reinterpretation of Shakespeare's play, if you love tales of intrigue, I strongly suggest that you read OPHELIA. You won't be disappointed.

He is Hamlet, Prince of Denmark; she is simply Ophelia. If you think you know their story, think again.
In this reimagining of Shakespeare's famous tragedy, it is Ophelia who takes center stage. A rowdy, motherless girl, she grows up at Elsinore Castle to become the queen's most trusted lady-in-waiting. Ambitious for knowledge and witty as well as beautiful, Ophelia learns the ways of power in a court where nothing is as it seems. When she catches the attention of the captivating, dark-haired Prince Hamlet, their love blossoms in secret. But bloody deeds soon turn Denmark into a place of madness, and Ophelia's happiness is shattered. Ultimately she must choose between her love for Hamlet and her own life. In desperation, Ophelia devises a treacherous plan to escape from Elsinore forever... with one very dangerous secret.
* * *
Ophelia is my absolute favorite play character of all time. She's, in my opinion, Shakespeare's greatest work within his greatest work (Hamlet is also my favorite play, and of course, in my eyes, the greatest play ever written.) So when I saw that my friends were reading this novel called Ophelia, I flipped and instantly ran out and bought it.

Lisa Klein did a great job reinventing Ophelia's and Hamlet's relationship, giving it life that we've never seen before in Shakespeare's play, going behind the scenes to show you what happens. She delves into the common controversies regarding this play (such as: was Ophelia pregnant with Hamlet's child? Was Ophelia really crazy? Did she really kill herself? {My answers to that are Yes, No, and Yes, all in that order.}) and Klein creates this intricate story around them.

I will admit that it started out amazing, and I was loving every moment of the plot twists and turns. I loved looking at the events of the play from a new, more modern perspective. But then half way through the story, things kinda took a turn for the weird, and then by the end, verged on "WTF just happened?" I have mixed emotions about this book, because I agreed with a lot of the things that Klein presented us with regarding the characters and the relationships between them, as well as motives that were vague in Shakespeare's original work. But once she began distorting things to fit the plot, I kind of put it down and said "Okay, this is getting a little freaky." But I always picked it back up again.

The writing was wonderful. I really feel that Klein stuck to the Shakespearean theme and tone, which is a ridiculously hard thing to do, so I applaud her for that.

The cover is not one of my favorites, mostly because that's not how I picture Ophelia at all. Looking at the cover sort of distorts my image of her, so I'm not such a big fan of it.

Basically, if you're not a Shakespeare enthusiast or not a Hamlet enthusiast, and are just looking for a good read, this is your book. If you are like me, you'll find yourself nit-picking every little thing and, also like me, won't enjoy it as much. It's a toss-up, really. But I do recommend it.

Plot: 2/5
Characters: 4/5
Writing: 5/5
Creativity\Uniqueness: 3/5
Cover: 1.5/5