STORIES FROM SHAKESPEARE

by Marchette Chute ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 27, 1956

There has been crying need for just such a book as this and in Marchette Chute the ideal interpreter has been found. She has succeeded in sharing her own joy in Shakespeare, and at no time does she write down to child level, rather choosing to assume the child's ability to attain the farther reach... Though the original intent was a selective group of the plays (as Charles and Mary Lamb did), the final decision was wisely to take the thirty six plays included in the First Folio, grouping them under Comedies, Tragedies, Histories. In reading them, one has a sense of participation; here is the situation, the background against which the story is set; here as they appear- the characters, their relations to each other and the plot clarified- without undue detail; here the pattern as the story unfolds. The narration is done in the present tense, as though the play is enacted and the narrator is serving as commentator. No attempt is made to amplify descriptive background, beyond what the text would supply -- and now and again extracts from the texts are used effectively. The introduction sketches the reason so much is demanded of the reader, the advantages and the disadvantages under which Shakespeare functioned. But the end result is that one adult reader finds herself persuaded to reread the plays themselves; and the hope is that younger readers will find in doing that very thing, the joy, the delight of discovery, with far more of understanding and appreciation than without the contagious enthusiasm of Marchette Chute's guidance. Even her gently humorous barbs at some of Shakespeare's absurdities tend to give the reader keeper delight in finding out more for himself.

Pub Date: Aug. 27, 1956

ISBN: 0452010616

Page Count: -

Publisher: World

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1956

Categories: FICTION