Shakespeare: His Work & His World

Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 2006. Soft Cover. Very Good +. Rosen makes the life and work of Shakespeare vibrant and exciting in this perfectly splendid biography. . . . Beautiful and engaging." — KIRKUS REVIEWS Gr 6 Up. "With the exclamation point in the first chapter title and the contraction and present tense in the opening sentence, Rosen's text announces its lively and compelling colloquial style. In exceptionally fresh and vivid terms, the author plies readers with abundant, accurate information on the playwright, his theater, and the plays, looking closely at A Midsummer Night's Dream, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, King Lear, and The Tempest. He presupposes some acquaintance with the best-known works (especially Macbeth), but the chief virtue of the text is the excitement that comes through the lucid descriptions-or evocations-of the plays, the poetry, and the period. He writes, too, about those parts of the bard's life that rouse curiosity: his schooling, marriage, will. The detailed time line is especially useful. The copious and engaging pencil-and-watercolor illustrations have the burnished look of old pictures and are as glorious as the text. They will lure many young people to read (and to brave the absence of paragraph indentation), as will the book's large, open typeface and attractive design. Better even than John Russell Brown's Shakespeare and His Theatre (Lothrop, 1982; o.p.), this volume justly serves its spectacular subject." Patricia Lothrop-Green, St. George's School, Scholl Library Journal. Book is in very good condition with minor edgewear, lightly bumped at spine and lower front corner.