Tag: Othello

William Shakespeare – A Midsummer Night’s Dream | Review

August 5, 2018
Authors P-T (By Surname)Fiction

Title: A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Author: William Shakespeare

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 194

Rating: 3/5

 

William Shakespeare - A Midsummer Night's Dream

William Shakespeare – A Midsummer Night’s Dream

 

This wasn’t my favourite of Shakespeare’s plays, but perhaps that’s because it’s a comedy instead of a tragedy. It just wasn’t particularly funny, probably because tastes have changed over the last several hundred years, and I’ve always preferred stuff with a bleak ending.

Still, it was nice to get to meet well-known characters like Puck and to see which parts have been absorbed into popular culture or parodied on television shows. I also found it super interesting to read all of the notes, although I waited until the end to do that. I learned a few things that I can put to use elsewhere.

But I’ve rated this on the play itself rather than on the notes, and it was a little bit of a disappointment for me after Othello, which had its flaws but which entertained me more. If I were to go and see a Shakespeare play, I wouldn’t pick A Midsummer Night’s Dream. But if I got a chance to go for free, I’d jump at the chance.

 

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

 

Click here to buy A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

William Shakespeare – Othello | Review

July 17, 2018
Authors P-T (By Surname)Fiction

Title: Othello

Author: William Shakespeare

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 240

Rating: 3.5/5

 

William Shakespeare - Othello

William Shakespeare – Othello

 

This play has been on my TBR pile for a while now, but I didn’t actually get around to picking it up until I saw that Roya Eve Reads, a fellow BookTuber, was reading it. It seemed like the perfect excuse to pick it up too, and I got more out of it than I was expecting to because my copy was second hand and somebody had written their own notes throughout it.

As for the play itself, I enjoyed it, although it was a tad melodramatic at times and there were a few times at which I thought that the plot didn’t really make sense. It was also overly theatrical and ever so slightly racist, but in a weird way it was also fairly progressive for the time at which it was written. And by that I’m basically referring to how Othello is black and how black protagonists were rare, but also how he’s described as thick-lipped. The edition that I had went to great pains to explain that people thought that the devil was black, which was kind of sad to read about.

Still, it’s a decent play and after reading it, I also wouldn’t mind going to see it performed sometime. Not my favourite Shakespeare play, but still a pleasure to read. Bring on A Midsummer Night’s Dream next month.

 

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

 

Click here to buy Othello.