Customer Reviews

Shakespeare in Love: The Love Poetry of William Shakespeare

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As a tie-in with the movie, this is a pretty great book. As a book of Shakespeare's sonnets and love poetry, it's not the best. It's a good book to own if you really enjoyed the movie or are just getting introduced to Shakespeare.

Funny, I always thought the purpose of poetry was to say in verse which cannot be said any other way. Sure, poetry CAN be pretty, and soothing, and serene --- but NEED NOT be !!

Why do poets use metaphors? To confuse? No, but to reveal .... same with poetry, and music, and literature, and ... oh, you get it ....

Buy the book, relish in the movie, return to the source, the Bard. If it takes fragmented verse to take in the whole, so be it ....

... makes a nice Valentines's Day gift ...

This book feels as good in your hands as the film felt in your heart. Wonderful sepiatone photographs from the film are intertwined with passages from Shakespeares's sonnets, plays and poems. Read it from front to back, open it anywhere, it's a "little touch of Shakespeare in the night" when the night was made for lovers.

Though definitely not the definitive source of a collection of Shakespeare's work, this little anthology is a handy pocket version of the best and best-known selections which go hand-in-hand with some very lovely pictures from the acclaimed movie, "Shakespeare in Love".

While the love of my own life may be no Joseph Fiennes, I found this book to be a terrific answer to that old rhetorical comment, "You want me to recite what???" Aah well, some just have poetry in their veins.

There are better collections of Shakespeare's works. The main sellint point here is obviously the tie-in with the movie, but it's still a very nice book.

If you liked the movie and want to read more romantic words from Shakespeare, you can hardly go wrong with this.

Shakespeare is one of the greatest writers of love poetry ever, and the pictures that accompany his works in this book add to the reader's enjoyment. However, some of his better writings from plays has been ommitted. For instance, The "Doubt thou..." from Hamlet, and many from a Midsummer Night's Dream.

While it's just a short collection of Shakesphere related to the movie, it's an easy read for people that aren't that well read with poetry. And it makes a great way to say I love you to someone. May be for Chritsmas or Valentines Day. I used it as a nice reference to place quotes in wedding cards.

I've seen many books that excerpt Will's love sonnets and dialogues, and this one is no different--except for one thing. It includes wonderful pictures from the movie--mostly of Joseph Fiennes and Gwyneth Paltrow. If you're a fan of the movie Shakespeare in Love (I am!!!!), you'll definitely love this book; however, if you're looking for a more complete verion of the Bard's work, you'd be better investing in an anthology.

I expect much more than only a selection of Shakespeare's sonnets, and a few quotes from his plays in this book. Perhaps I am too greedy, but I expected all the 154 sonnets of Shakespeare in this book.

But the photos from the movie are beautiful. The movie's fans will enjoy looking at them.

The purpose of all truly good poetry is to reduce stress in readers or listeners, calming them both physically and emotionally. This has been proven in many scientific studies, but these poems only create more stress due to their subject matter, which is source of anxiety and tension for all but the luckiest of mortals. The filmmakers would have done better by their fellow man had they refrained from reprinting these misguided poems from an earlier, more insensitive era in our species' history.