One of the best books I've read on Shakespeare's writing - because that is exactly what it concentrates on. John Barton is highly regarded among actors as a practical analyst of Shakespearean verse and prose, giving often simple but penetrating advice. His trademark method is to use verse or sentence structures and lexical choices to decipher some very specific and useful instructions encoded by Shakespeare for the actors. Stands the test of time
Ted Hughes told Andrew Motion, not long before he died, that writing this book had shortened his life - all that prose was killing him. It's certainly hefty, dense, and the unwieldy central premise - that Shakespeare developed certain mythical themes and variations throughout the canon - owes more to Hughes' imagination than Shakespeare's. This is why it was criticised on release, criticism which hurt Hughes. But taken on its own eccentric terms, its a hell of a book, shot through with great insights into the plays and the personality behind them. Hughes on Shakespeare's poetry is worth the price alone. Give it a go.
