Tales From Shakespeare Student Edition Complete And Unabridged

We have this in our Morning Time Basket to rotate with other books. We are enjoying this easy to understand book.

We enjoy reading these stories aloud. They're perfect for a young audience but challenging enough for a homeschool parent or teacher.

I had high hopes for this book that it would give a gentle introduction to Shakespeare for my 10yo daughter. I gave this book four stars because for what it is, it’s a very good book; it just wasn’t a good fit for us. My daughter found a couple of the stories too creepy and weird. I thought that there was a lot of info-dumping and not enough dialogue. I wound up giving the book to my cousin after reading only 2 maybe 3 of the 20 stories.

This book tells the story of many Shakespeare plays in prose. It was purchased for a 9 year old and a 13 year old and both love it. By the time they study Shakespeare in school they'll know what each play is about and the characters so they can just enjoy (or hate) the form in which the bard wrote.

I am 65 years old, and I still remember reading this in high school, and thoroughly enjoying it. Believe me, I was no bookworm; mainly survived by reading Cliff's Notes and book jacket summaries. For some reason, however, I actually read this book and loved it, much to my surprise. I highly recommend Lamb's Tales.

I don't like this book as part of my 2nd grade homeschool curriculum. My kids do not understand it. Other than that though, it is very good. I will keep it for middle school.

Bought this for a semester on Britihs literature as it contains key works. Kids got a lot out of it; worth the price!

Great synopsis of selected plays written in narrative form using 18th-century English.

L'ho trovato molto interessante mi piace leggere libri anche in altre lingue per una passione personale e sinceramente su Amazon trovo di tutto di più grazie mille

Thank you for sending this book so I can read it to my friends and family

I was surprise that the book has no index

“Tales from Shakespeare” which summarises 20 of Shakespeare’s plays, was published in 1807 by Charles and Mary Lamb, to introduce “young readers” to Shakespeare. The main story line of each of the 20 plays is captured in 7 – 10 pages for each play. It is a handy size with a clear font. But …This book is subtitled “Student edition” so I expected it to contain more than just the original edition. I expected extra material to assist and inform the modern day student. But it contains nothing more than the original plays, with the original (1807) introduction. It contains more misprints than any other book I have ever read. The misspelling ( or failures to proof read) begin on the fourth line of the preface, which, ironically, states that “ diligent are” has been taken instead of “diligent care” In “A midsummer night’s dream” – Oberon’s famous opening line “Ill met by moonlight” is rendered as ” I’ll met by moonlight”. In some cases the misprints are funny. In “The merchant of Venice” – Portia speaks of “the noble quality of merry” ! And in “Romeo and Juliet” Paris comes across the “dreary spectacle of a lifeless corset” ( corpse). Ten lines later we learn of the flowers to be strewn on her corset. Three paragraphs later Romeo addresses Tybalt’s corse (corpse again !) Some of the mistakes are so puzzling that they disrupt the attention. In “Much ado about nothing” Benedick is quoted as saying “By tints hand, Claudio shall …” which completely threw me until I realised it should have been “By this hand”. Some words left me completely baffled. In “Two gentlemen of Verona ” Valentine proposes that he will procure a rope ladder “Tatting” for that purpose. Some misprints are hard to understand because Shakespeare’s original word is no longer in common use. In “Twelfth Night” - “the young dissemisler” can be de-coded as meaning young dissembler – but this is an example where a proper student edition would have an explanation of the word dissembler. In the same way – the word caitiff in “Timon of Athens” really needs the explanation that it is a middle English word for a coward. And again – when - in “Romeo and Juliet” Tybalt declares that Romeo has come to the Capulet’s banquet to “fleer and scorn” - it does not mean to sneer and scorn – fleer is a middle English verb meaning to laugh jeeringly. A real edition for students would make that clear. Lambs “Tales from Shakespeare” is interesting in itself – as an insight into early nineteenth century English language and the then current interpretations of Shakespeare. I doubt that any “young person” under the age of seventeen could understand any of the tales as they are written. Any modern reader, let alone a “young person” will need at least a dictionary to hand. Even without the mistakes – this book needs footnotes or addenda to help the modern reader. I cannot recommend this version. There are lots of other editions to choose from.