Customer Reviews

ShakesFear and How to Cure It!

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This book offers so many things for the classroom teacher, from suggestions for class projects, to readings for staging. It looks at Shakespeare from the aspect of performance--which is, after all, what his plays were written for. It will abolish your students groans, and inspire your (and their) creativity. Very practical. Very helpful. Worth reading and using.

This book is an indispensable resource; easy to use and motivational in so many ways. No English teacher should go without it! From how to stage bits of the play in the classroom to how to properly use filmed versions without losing your students' attention, this book has it all. It even includes sections on most of the commonly taught Shakespeare plays, including activity ideas and insight into the plays.

I am a young teacher still trying to figure out how to teach Shakespeare to my tenth grade students. Not only is this text charming and phenomenally well written, it is also filled with helpful facts about each and everyone of Shakespeare's plays. There are helpful activities, information and a breakdown of the films you could use to help your students to understand the play. Shakesfear is a must have for any teacher's lesson plan arsenal. This book delivers on its promises, it definitely eliminates the "fear" surrounding teaching Shakespeare.

In stead of "translating" Shakespeare like many "No Fear Shakespeare" books do, this book offers ways to get your students to enjoy the language Shakespeare wrote in: ours. Dr. Cohen's language is strait and to the point, not the dence, scholarly, language that many of these books are written in. The book is also entertaining and fun to read. The best part is: the teaching strategies in this book work! Bring the Bard back; by this Book!

This eminently readable and entertaining book offers inspiration and ideas for teaching Shakespeare on all levels. If you need easy and immediate ideas for breaking down students' objections to Shakespeare, this book will provide lessons you can read and walk straight into the classroom and teach with success. At the least, students will remember these lessons; at the most, their Shakesfear (and yours) will be cured!

Though this book offers invaluable teaching tools on many of Shakespeare's plays, it's greatest contribution is the introduction, which serves to stride the biggest hurdles in teaching and learning Shakespeare. It's required reading in all my classes.

Then buy this book. Study it, keep it under your pillow and try in all manners to make Shakespeare fun.

At first, Shakespeare is difficult, but Dr. Cohen helps you guide yourself and your students into the final realization that Shakespeare is fun and easy.

Sally forth and read.

I am afraid that I must offer my dissent to the other comments (mostly, it seems, from Virginia).

I have read Mr. Cohen's book carefully. I must say that it is a sad reflection on the state of education that what once would have been regarded as games appropriate for junior high school students are now promoted as useful for college Shakespeare students. To be blunt, there is very little in this book which would be of interest in a genuine literature course.

In addition, Mr. Cohen appears to misunderstand much in Shakespeare. His comments on Polonius are preposterous and he doesn't understand the Merchant of Venice at all. Many further examples could be added easily. Incidentally, contrary to Mr. Cohen's characterization, Beethoven's Ninth Symphony is in no sense a "wrapping up" akin to what he thinks of the Tempest (perhaps correctly). Beethoven died with many plans for new works including sketches for a tenth symphony.

Mr. Cohen has peppered the book with quite a few bits of nonsense. For example, he states: "Only a fool believes his language is superior to others." If the language in question is English, the opposite is true. With a good deal of credit due Shakespeare.

Finally: William Shakespeare was born in the middle of the sixteenth century and lived until the early years of the seventeenth. He was a product of England, of English culture, of English civilization. Our debt to England is therefore beyond measure. Mr Cohen seems to have forgotten this when launches into a "multiculturalist" rant (page 15 and following). I have always found the anti-Stratfordians offensive because they are, in effect, trying to steal the life's work of the man William Shakespeare. By "multiculturializing," if I may coin a word, by taking "England" out of Shakespeare, people like Mr. Cohen are doing the same thing.

I must add that Mr. Cohen is responsible for the Blackfriars Theatre in Staunton, Virginia, which presents some of the most engaging, involving performances of Shakespeare in the world. For this he deserves the highest praise and our gratitude.