Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Delightful Shakespeare, 2 Aug 2004
I bought this book because I am very keen on Shakespeare and it looked like an amusing read. The locals of Stratford want to celebrate Whitsuntide with a Mystery Play, a play on a subject from the bible, but they have no story and no actors to put it on. To the rescue comes young Will Shakespeare, sixteen-year-old apprentice to his father, a glover. The only play he can find, however, is the story of Cain and Abel, and most of that has been eaten by mice. What to do? The obvious solution is to fill in the missing bits himself. As he does so, however, he finds the characters taking on a life of their own, and soon he realises he has gone far beyond the basic story that formed his source. Meanwhile, his friends are busy learning their parts, arguing about which parts they want to play, whether they want to play female characters, and trying to cope with Will changing the story on a daily basis.
Speaking as someone who enjoys Shakespeare, I thought this was a delightful book. Jan Mark has clearly done her research, and we get a good idea of the conditions of the time. It also demonstrates very well the way that plays were written in Shakespeare's day: a writer would come up with the bare bones of the story, and then change things as rehearsals progressed, as better ideas came to him, and as he gets a better idea of what his actors are capable of. I particularly liked the way Adrian, Shakespeare's friend and director of the play, becomes more and more panic-stricken as he realises that the story is changing so much that he has no idea what's going to happen in each new version.
The novel is light on description but has plenty of dialogue which moves things forward very quickly. There is very little to think about, but that's fine if you want a good, witty story to fill a few hours, as well as a painless way of entering the joyful world of Shakespeare. One aspect I particularly liked was the way the writer explains how people's moods can change them, likening our frame of mind to a compass, which may point away from north for a while, i.e. when our mood is low, but which will eventually return to the true direction, i.e. when our true nature reasserts itself.
In short, this is a delightful book, and if everyone read this, they would finish it raring to move on to Shakespeare's plays.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Very, very, very nice book!, 26 Oct 2004
I really liked reading this book. It was funny, very pleasant to read, and very well told. I read it whenever I had time, and it read very smoothly. The book sometimes shows a bit of the language from Shakespeare's time, and it was a joy to read those old forms. The book shows how life was at that time, or at least a part of it. I (as a Belgian) read mostly Dutch books, and only occasionally English ones, but from all the English books I've read, this is one of the best. I love the way the characters are presented, 'cause they are so life like, that it almost seems like the author knew them herself. Another good thing about them is that they change as the story goes on. They start thinking in another way, which proves that Jan Mark is a very good author, 'cause she knows how to create characters who are almost like real persons. I love this book, and I'm pretty sure that if you read it, you'll love it too.
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