Customer Reviews

William Shakespeare the Complete Works

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

 

 

This book is a great edition, it is probably the best completeworks of Shakespeare available, especially for us poor collegestudents. It has an easy to follow layout, and the works areorganized logically by the comedies, the histories, the tragedies, andthe poetry. Excellent Shakespeare collection,..., a great value.Excellent!!

(This review is of course not on the plays and works themselves which are beyond praise, but on this particular edition).

All pieces are packed in two columns, without separating pages, a few ugly frontispices, no table of content. Typography is old, greasy. Looks like the fac-simile of a cheap 19th century edition. No notes, no variants, no references, unpractical to read or to use in study, no added value. I do not recommend this at all for any purpose.

Upon opening this book I immediately turned to my favourite play, Romeo and Juliet. My favourite scene is the opening battle between the Montagues and the Capulets. But what have we here? Suddenly the families are reversed. Sampson and Gregory are servants to Montague, not Capulet, and Abraham has apparently switched teams as well. Gregory says that one of his kinsmen is coming, and then Benvolio enters. Benvolio is a montague, which just goes to prove that they are montagues, and not servants of capulet. I don't know the rest of the plays as well, but for all I know there could be many more easily missed mistakes in the text.

Several reviewers have criticized this version for its lack of commentary. This may be true. But for the reader who wants a complete collection in a beautifully bound copy, of Shakespeare's works this is an incredible bargain. You will learn much.

I feel that you will actually learn more by reading it *without* commentary first. In that way you will gain your own opinion of the works. Any other way would be like someone telling you what to think of a Van Gogh and then seeing it - you would be biased.

An interesting note for pop music fans - you may notice a certain 'similarity' between music by The Police and Sting and Shakespeare's sonnets.

Buy this book - you won't be disappointed.

This is the Complete Works of Shakespeare, with a few illustrations, and nothing more. There are no annotations, and no modern introductions.

Some will fault this edition for its lack of annotations. I say that, although annotations are necessary for scholarly study of the Works, they can very much distract the reader who reads for pleasure. I find that half the fun of reading Shakespeare is trying to figure out what the meaning of the text is; annotations rob me of this.

I once had the misfortune of reading an annotated version of King Lear. At one point, King Lear makes an obscure, non sequitur remark (in Act 1, Scene 5). Was I given the opportunity to think about this remark, ponder it, decide for myself what this remark really meant? No: a footnote was there to do it for me. So I suggest you consider using a non-annotated edition for reading, and save the annotated versions for in-depth study.

Some might fault this edition for the quality of the binding. Although I am not an expert on bindings, I find the binding to be at least better than a typical paperback. Furthermore, the book is very lightweight; I would be surprised if it isn't the world's lightest Complete Works. For this reason, I find it surprisingly comfortable to hold as I read.

This edition comes with a ribbon sewn into the binding for use as a bookmark. Not only is the ribbon very useful, but it's also easy enough to cut off if it annoys you.

Some will fault this edition for the quality of the text. Indeed, the text has the character of an early twentieth century newspaper. I wouldn't be surprised if this edition was printed with plates from that time. Although not very clean, the text readable enough.

Probably the worst thing about this edition is the continuation lines--somtimes a long line will continue into empty space on the line above or below it. That takes some getting used to, especially since it's sometime ambiguous what line a continuation belongs to.

The best thing about this edition is the price, only about US$20.

What they don't tell you is, this is LITERALLY a pocket edition. It is 0.75 inches by 0.3 inches, and the pages are so small and thin you need special equipment to read them. The book fits neatly in the pocket of my pants or my shirt. It even fits in my shoe.

By the way, my shoe also fits in my shirt pocket.

Shakespeare's works are quite engaging. Like all great writers he wrote of "the heart in conflict with itself." It is hard to go wrong reading Shakespeare... Okay, now I'm laughing. The very idea of a review of Shakespeare is just funny for some reason. You can't review Shakespeare. And the "how many stars?" thing-- come on. This is Shakespeare we're talking about here. In other news, be sure and read "Castle of Wisdom." If you like Shakespeare, you'll totally dig it.

Well, it's not the best and definitely not the worst, but what you buy is what you get. This book of course comes in the play version form, you know, with the Act I, Scene II kind of thing. And I know it's not in story book form but what'd you expect? It's the complete works and probably how he wrote it in the first place. It has all the plays(by SHAKESPEARE) that you could ask for, including poetry and sonnets. I think that so far it has been a thrill and an interesting read.

What they don't tell you is, this is LITERALLY a pocket edition. It is 0.75 inches by 0.3 inches, and the pages are so small and thin you need special equipment to read them. The book fits neatly in the pocket of my pants or my shirt. It even fits in my shoe.

By the way, my shoe also fits in my shirt pocket.

i want the whole story,including picture.