Customer Reviews
Great, but flawed - By: Kirk McElhearn, 11 Oct 2008 
I don't want to rain on the parade, but, while this is a truly great book because of its content, the production of the book is flawed enough to be problematic. The paper is much too thin, making it hard, at times, to read the text. This is especially difficult for the introductory essays, which run across the entire page width. (The text of the plays themselves isin single columns, not double, as oftenin complete Shakespeare editions.) So if you buy this sight unseen, as I did, be aware that your reading experience may not be optimal.
A beautiful book - By: JC, 15 Sep 2008 
This is a gorgeous book to hold. The print quality is just right, & the all time master of the English language shines through. The footnotes don't alway's hit the right balance, between excess & shortage, but are never intrusive. It is still amazing to me that this man, from so long ago,in such a different age & circumstance, without the advantages we enjoy, should still stand unparalleled as the greatest writerin English with depth, insight & poetry dripping constantly from the mouths of his dramatic creations. If you baulk at the price, by all means enjoy a cheaper copy, there'll be somein your nearby charity shop, but this edition is well worth it to me.
All the world and more is here - By: Sphex, 19 Aug 2008 In his foreword to this magnificent edition, Michael Boyd reminds us that Shakespeare's plays were originally scripts for companies of actors & "not written as literature" to be readin an armchair at home. Performance is what matters, & the reading of the text is always going to be an incomplete experiencein comparison. So why bother? For me, that incompleteness is still going to be more rewarding than reading most books ever published, but the real payoff comes next time I see the play performed, when I'm that little bit more prepared, that little bit less confused by the language, & that little bit more ready to appreciate a great performance, whether it's by a star actor on a national stage or a complete unknown at a fringe venue. This edition worksin so many ways to make our experience of Shakespeare more complete.
The General Introduction by Jonathan Bate covers a lot of familiar territory - Shakespeare's lifein Stratford, his early reputation as the "upstart crow", his rise to preeminence as scriptwriter for & shareholderin the Lord Chamberlain's Men, & so on, & the problem for any writer on Shakespeare is how to stitch our patchwork knowledge into a finer garment, how to find a new angle without resorting to arcane questions that are of scholarly interest only. Bate's command of the material & his choice of detail, his straightforward style that never fakes meaning with jargon, & the consistent perspective that emphasizes performance, all work towards opening up these million or so words. There is a refreshing emphasis on just how much we do know, contradicting the common view trotted out evenin the RSC's own programmes that "very little is known" of his life. Bate acknowledges that we "will never know what drove his ambition" but Shakespeare is far from being the cipher so beloved of anti-Stratfordians.
The brief introductory essays to each play continuein this elegant way by avoiding stale opinion on the one hand & abstruse academic innovation on the other. They are a model of clarity & lucidity, as though he instinctively realizes that since reading the plays itself involves dealing with multiply-layered words he won't add to your burden. Much Ado, for example, begins "with the end of a war" & moves from combat to courtship. The change of mood is abrupt with the interruption of Hero & Claudio's wedding, & Bate captures thisin language we can all understand: "Its atmosphere has been all holiday. No more." There is a crispness that makes me feel I'm learning something new even when it comes to the more familiar plays. As for a less well known play like Timon, he has the knack of drawing youin with a surprising fact: it's uniquein that no onein the play "has a blood relationship to anyone else". A detail like this is a fascinating bit of fuel to get you up & running (or at least walking with determination!).
Like the Bible, the plays present textual problemsin that no original manuscripts survive & there are different versions of many passages. Decisions have to be made, the key one for this edition being to base it on the 1623 First Folio. This "solves" at a stroke the difficult problem of how best to combine the different versions into one. Textual questions (often fascinatingin their own right) over Quarto & Folio readings are gathered together at the end of each play,in contrast to, for example, the Arden editions, which can often have such long footnotes that there is only space for a couple of lines of the play, which is always to get the balance wrong. There is no such intrusion here: on any given page it is clear what takes precedence, the play itself, laid outin single column with all the elements working efficiently around it.
Notes are handledin small type at the foot of the page, each word or phrase repeatedin bold following the line number (so avoiding markersin the text). These usually give one or more meanings, the majority of which are helpful. Only rarely is there a sign of dumbing down, as when "Florentine" is glossed as a "person from the city of Florence,in north-west Italy". More fascinating & subversive of polite society is the anti-Bowdlerization at work. Lewd meanings are unashamedly (andin surprising numbers) laid bare. Mistress Quickly's complaint that her "case is open to the world" causes no titters from most audiences, who are innocentin their ignorance of Shakespeare's appetite for filth. Parents & teachers be warned: keep this out of reach of your children - it's full of sex & knife crime & should on no account be allowedin the classroom!
Hamlet admires the travelling players who have returned to Elsinore as "the abstracts & brief chronicles of the time". For anyone who's sat through a seemingly interminable production of Shakespeare, it may seem incredible that there's anything brief about his plays, but for most of the original audience, wanting to be told stories of their nation's history, Holinshed's massive volumes were never an option & an afternoon on the South Bank was a no-brainer. Unlike that original theatre-going public, we're lucky to have his plays to read & study outside the playhouse, but we should not forget where it all started.
I've read enough of the two thousand pages to give it five stars, which is not a judgement on Shakespeare (he hardly needs my endorsement) but on how he's been packaged. Most wrappers get ripped off & thrown away: this one is made of finer material & will serve anyone with even a smattering of interestin our greatest writer. Just don't expect to read it on the bus.
Ten star review - By: Lien, 01 Jun 2008 I had this given as a birthday presant & all i can say is WOW.I have only recently got into Shakespeare & have seen a couple of the plays already & i just wanted to enchance my viewing of them,as i,m going to see four this year.And this book dose it.Its brilliantly put together with every thing W.S. wrote & more I think!.If could put TEN stars at the top i would.
The right 'Shakespeare Complete Works' for the right person... - By: Mr. J. A. Edwards, 27 May 2008 
One of the features that is most attractive about this latest edition of Shakespeare's plays is its layout. The text is of a pleasantly large size, & glosses of the meanings of certain words is easy to access at the bottom of the page. The introductions are great - althoughin other editions there are more extensive and/or scholarly introductions to the plays, these are well written, & are still very readable if you are about to read the play for the first time. The style of writing is pleasantly unassumingin that respect. So for people reading Shakespeare for pleasure I would highly recommend this book.
However, at pointsin my degree I've slightly regretted my choice, for a number of reasons. Firstly, the paper, to allow the book to be not too thick whilst having text occurringin only one column per page, must be very thin. As a consequence of this it tends to wrinkle slightly if you put your fingers on it for too long. The Riverside Shakespeare solves this problem because it has textin two columns down the page, (it still has glosses of difficult words at the bottom of the page) & this allows the paper to be slightly thicker, & so you are not worried that you are going to tear it.
The text itself is pretty good, although it sometimes differs quite strongly from the Arden text. This is not a faultin itself, but as the Arden text is the major editing of our time, this can sometimes cause slight problems. Of course, if you're not doing a degree when you need to read literature about the texts then this will not apply to you. An example would be the play 'Hamlet', where the quarto text is a lot longer than the folio text, & this text sticks to the folio text. This is okay, but the Norton edition, I think, gets round this really well by putting the bits which arein the quarto but notin the folio,in their place butin italics. That is really useful.
Anyhow, unless your hoping to study shakespeare at a advanced level this text is fine. It is really beautifully presented, & easy to access.
