Your review was great and definitely makes me want to read Shapiro's book. I understand about feeling a lack of history knowledge when reading books like this. I have read a decent amount of British history, but there so much and people are very hard to keep straight, especially if they are titled aristocracy. I have been reading the Wolf Hall trilogy this year and I have to refer back to the list of characters periodically to refresh my memory if someone shows up who hasn't been mentioned in a while.
I love rabbit trail/hole reading! This book is great for that. One book leads to following this way or that way and off I go. One event leads to another to explore and I find myself down the hole. Love it. I read this because of you. Thanks for giving me new trails to follow! 🐰🐇
Carmen, I'm so impressed and flattered that you read this book! It definitely is a LOT of rabbit holes to explore and then off we go on another path. Let me know what books this one may lead you to. Thanks so much for reading, watching and commenting! It means so much to me! 💛
This book sounds fascinating! I’m not a great history reader either, but I find it fascinating when I can view it through the lens of the art I love. I’ll be putting this on my wishlist for sure! 💜
Kelly - this was an incredible review. I have heard of the Gunpowder Plot, but hadn’t really realized what was going on around that time in literature. This book is definitely going on my list to read after I read King Lear and Antony & Cleopatra. Macbeth is one of my favorites though. When I was about 14, my best friends sister (theater major) was part of the production and she told us about the “curse.” I remember feeling so sophisticated being “in the know” about it. 😂😂😂
Oh, Loretta, you are so sweet. I stumbled here and there - will the rest of my videos be this difficult to make? I hope not! So glad it's going on your TBR and if and when you get to it, you absolutely must tell me what you think! I love your story about being "in the know." LOL!
I'm about halfway through and finding it very interesting. I like the way Shapiro shows links between current events and the play texts. Also I'm getting a sense of Shakespeare as a working guy who had to balance lots of risks and powerful folks' preferences - not just a genius pouring out ideas with complete autonomy. Great pick, I'm glad you steered me to it. Yeah we're big on Bonfire Night here, though Halloween has come from nowhere in recent decades. We watched BBC 1982 Cymbeline this afternoon but only made it half way 😢 I'm enjoying reading it and looking at artistic renditions of Imogen.
Roy, I am very excited to hear your perspective on this book when you finish it! If you make a video, please tag me so I don't miss it. It's interesting to think that the origin for Bonfire Night came from an event that happened while Shakespeare was alive and that it might have encouraged him to write Macbeth! Thanks for much for watching and commenting!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this, Kelly -- it sounds really good! I always find it mindboggling that Shakespeare was alive during the gunpowder plot. I think I must have compartmentalised Shakespeare's life a little bit there!
@@aaronfacer It never really occurred to me the significance of the Gunpowder Plot on anyone living at that time, let alone Shakespeare’s! You Brits have too much history! American history is very condensed in comparison. 😂💛
Well done Kelly! This was so interesting. I know virtually nothing about this time period - really enjoyed hearing more about it. I need to read more history!
Thanks so much for watching, Gina! Yes, this book was such an eye-opener in the sense of how thinking that as history is taking place around an artist, they are influenced by that. I'm not really sure how to take on more history in my reading, but the Shakespeare part of this book was so much easier than the history part! LOL! 💛
God's nightgown Kelly. I felt the Scottish play was cursed when I was reading it for english finals, back in the day. I love the historical aspects of the book. Go well Kelly.
@booksimnotreading I should add I saw a wonderful production of the play in the Sydney Opera House as prep for the exams and it completely changed my mind about Shakespeare. The Bell Shakespeare Company here in Sydney encourages young folks to embrace Shakespeare. I think at the time it cost a princely sum of $5 for a matinee session. It was wonderful. Those in the front seats were warned that there would be a lot of blood involved and plastic ponchos were offered. It was crazy and manic and left a lasting impression.
I haven't read this but I hope to one day. I read most of 1599, the earlier one, and would like to finish that off and then pick up the story. I also don't read a lot of history, but this sounds accessible enough for me, focused around a figure (and some plays) that I find very interesting. There were such seismic events in that time - the plague, the gunpowder plot - yet without knowing about them we can completely overlook the impact that they could have had on Shakespeare. Enjoyed your review.
@@tillysshelf Thanks so much Tilly! I’m sure this would be a much easier read for you than me since my British history is pretty sketchy! 😃 When you get around to it, I’d love to know what you think! Thanks so much for watching and commenting! 💛🎭
I'm slowly reading 1599 by Shapiro. A lot of history, yes, definitely not a fast read. I hope to read The Year of Lear next year, it would be too much to read both now. I'm tempted to reread Macbeth since it's one of my favorite plays, but we'll see how September goes. Btw, I love the thumbnail!😊
@@LanaCelebic Thank you! Of course you can’t read both of those books this month! That’s too much to take in all at once. But I do want to know what you think of the 1599 book when you finish it. 😃 Thanks for commenting! 💛🎭
Oh, I'd love to hear what you think of it! You'd probably find the history part of it much easier than I did! :) Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
Hi Kelly, hope you are having a great weekend! Thank you for another great review--you have given so many great recommendations, it's hard to keep up! I have never heard of the Shapiro books before, but these look interesting. I generally wasn't into reading history, but have become more open to the genre over time. Certainly, it can definitely add context and enhance understanding towards appreciating a work of art. Currently, I am very slowly reading through an old school book of criticism from my father's collection, "Shakespearean Tragedy" by A.C. Bradley. He analyzes Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth and (I haven't read it yet) Antony and Cleopatra. As an aside, not sure how much you love film, but Akira Kurosawa (the famous Japanese director) made at least two Shakespeare adaptations: "Throne of Blood" (influenced by Macbeth) and "Ran" (influenced by "King Lear"). Worth checking out (especially "Ran")....Best, Joe
Yes, Jason keeps talking to me about Throne of Blood and Ran, but I still haven't seen them. We don't own either of them, which is a bit shocking to me. We will get to them! I'm so glad that I'm giving you recommendations and I sincerely hope you enjoy them. I don't mind random comments so if you do read this book, I hope you'll feel free on any video of mine to tell me about your experience. I would love to know your thoughts! Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
Got my copy of Year of the Lear yesterday. Looks great to me, though I've only read a few pages. It's such a big deal time in history, though. The Plague, King James bible, Guy Fawkes, and a significant expansion of theatre, though the Puritans shut that down a couple decades later :-( Thanks for the review and for hosting Shaketember.
Larry, thank you so much for watching and commenting on my video! I really appreciate it! I'd love to hear what you think when you finish reading it! There was SO MUCH going on, you are right. I had no idea. But this book really altered my perspective about what people were experiencing at that time. I look forward to hearing more of your thoughts!
@@booksimnotreading I just love what you, Jason, and Nicolle are doing with Shaketember. We need more Shakespeare events. I'll be happy to tell you what I think of Year of Lear if I can get it read soon. I'm going to try to sneak half an hour per day towards that goal but right now I'm up to my eye brows with "gotta reads." I'm reading Cymbeline and I've told Nicolle that I'm going to reread King Lear for Shaketember. I'd also like to get to Twelfth Night during the event. For each play I always review what Marjorie Garber (Shakespeare After All) and Harold Bloom (Invention of the Human) so I'm kinda-sorta busy with Shakespeare right now. Thanks again to all three of you for hosting this event.
Thank you, Stuart. That's so kind of you. I'm not sure that it's that impressive, but I hope you enjoyed the video. Guess what's coming soon (OK, soon might be stretching it, but it IS going to happen)??? Jason got all our music out!!! :)
I started writing a promised review of "Year of the Lear" but then realized that it had to fit into a TH-cam comment. So I started over, reducing my comments to, well, a comment. I begin with reference to your comment that you really don't like reading histories. I think this is the plight of North American schooling, the same schooling that ruined Shakespeare and poetry for many of us. History, like Shakespeare is turned into dates and names, turning the subject into testable facts and all life drained from it. But, there are history writers who tell stories and James Shapiro is one of them. If you read him as a story-teller rather than a historian, his work reads like Middlemarch, only he's talking about the Gunpowder Plot and King James' attempts to unify Great Britain rather than the political reforms that Ms Brooke is living through in Middlemarch. He does "analyze" his stories as he relates events to Shakespeare's writing but, after all, that's why a book like Year of the Lear is called Year of the Lear :-) I loved this book and thank you for introducing it to me. Gaining a connection between Shakespeare's writing and what he was experiencing/reading is illuminating. I'm in the middle of Lear right now and Year of the Lear is playing in my mind as I do. It's making the complexity of Lear just a wee bit easier to follow and understand.
@@larrymarshall9454 Larry, this was great! I am so glad you enjoyed this book so much, and I do intend to read more of Shapiro in the future. I am reading Macbeth now and seeing all kinds of details that I hadn’t before. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with me! I hope you’ll stick around after Shaketember! 💛
Your review was great and definitely makes me want to read Shapiro's book. I understand about feeling a lack of history knowledge when reading books like this. I have read a decent amount of British history, but there so much and people are very hard to keep straight, especially if they are titled aristocracy. I have been reading the Wolf Hall trilogy this year and I have to refer back to the list of characters periodically to refresh my memory if someone shows up who hasn't been mentioned in a while.
@@LaurieInTexas Thanks so much, Laurie! 💛🎭
I love rabbit trail/hole reading! This book is great for that. One book leads to following this way or that way and off I go. One event leads to another to explore and I find myself down the hole. Love it. I read this because of you. Thanks for giving me new trails to follow! 🐰🐇
Carmen, I'm so impressed and flattered that you read this book! It definitely is a LOT of rabbit holes to explore and then off we go on another path. Let me know what books this one may lead you to. Thanks so much for reading, watching and commenting! It means so much to me! 💛
This book sounds fascinating! I’m not a great history reader either, but I find it fascinating when I can view it through the lens of the art I love. I’ll be putting this on my wishlist for sure! 💜
@@genteelblackhole Oh, good! I look forward to hearing your thoughts when you get around to it. Thank you so much for watching and commenting! 💛🎭
Kelly - this was an incredible review. I have heard of the Gunpowder Plot, but hadn’t really realized what was going on around that time in literature. This book is definitely going on my list to read after I read King Lear and Antony & Cleopatra. Macbeth is one of my favorites though. When I was about 14, my best friends sister (theater major) was part of the production and she told us about the “curse.” I remember feeling so sophisticated being “in the know” about it. 😂😂😂
Oh, Loretta, you are so sweet. I stumbled here and there - will the rest of my videos be this difficult to make? I hope not! So glad it's going on your TBR and if and when you get to it, you absolutely must tell me what you think! I love your story about being "in the know." LOL!
I'm about halfway through and finding it very interesting. I like the way Shapiro shows links between current events and the play texts. Also I'm getting a sense of Shakespeare as a working guy who had to balance lots of risks and powerful folks' preferences - not just a genius pouring out ideas with complete autonomy. Great pick, I'm glad you steered me to it. Yeah we're big on Bonfire Night here, though Halloween has come from nowhere in recent decades. We watched BBC 1982 Cymbeline this afternoon but only made it half way 😢 I'm enjoying reading it and looking at artistic renditions of Imogen.
Roy, I am very excited to hear your perspective on this book when you finish it! If you make a video, please tag me so I don't miss it. It's interesting to think that the origin for Bonfire Night came from an event that happened while Shakespeare was alive and that it might have encouraged him to write Macbeth! Thanks for much for watching and commenting!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this, Kelly -- it sounds really good! I always find it mindboggling that Shakespeare was alive during the gunpowder plot. I think I must have compartmentalised Shakespeare's life a little bit there!
@@aaronfacer It never really occurred to me the significance of the Gunpowder Plot on anyone living at that time, let alone Shakespeare’s! You Brits have too much history! American history is very condensed in comparison. 😂💛
Well done Kelly! This was so interesting. I know virtually nothing about this time period - really enjoyed hearing more about it. I need to read more history!
Thanks so much for watching, Gina! Yes, this book was such an eye-opener in the sense of how thinking that as history is taking place around an artist, they are influenced by that. I'm not really sure how to take on more history in my reading, but the Shakespeare part of this book was so much easier than the history part! LOL! 💛
I'm reading this right now and finding it fascinating. I'm not sure that I would have picked it up under normal circumstances, but it is amazing!
@@32mybelle Oh! I am so glad you are enjoying it! Please let me know what you think of it when you finish! 💛🎭
God's nightgown Kelly. I felt the Scottish play was cursed when I was reading it for english finals, back in the day. I love the historical aspects of the book. Go well Kelly.
@@nathanfoung2347 God’s Nightgown, Nathan! You were lucky to read it then. I had gray hair when I finally read it! Be well, friend. 💛🎭
@booksimnotreading I should add I saw a wonderful production of the play in the Sydney Opera House as prep for the exams and it completely changed my mind about Shakespeare.
The Bell Shakespeare Company here in Sydney encourages young folks to embrace Shakespeare. I think at the time it cost a princely sum of $5 for a matinee session. It was wonderful. Those in the front seats were warned that there would be a lot of blood involved and plastic ponchos were offered. It was crazy and manic and left a lasting impression.
I haven't read this but I hope to one day. I read most of 1599, the earlier one, and would like to finish that off and then pick up the story. I also don't read a lot of history, but this sounds accessible enough for me, focused around a figure (and some plays) that I find very interesting. There were such seismic events in that time - the plague, the gunpowder plot - yet without knowing about them we can completely overlook the impact that they could have had on Shakespeare. Enjoyed your review.
@@tillysshelf Thanks so much Tilly! I’m sure this would be a much easier read for you than me since my British history is pretty sketchy! 😃 When you get around to it, I’d love to know what you think! Thanks so much for watching and commenting! 💛🎭
I'm slowly reading 1599 by Shapiro. A lot of history, yes, definitely not a fast read. I hope to read The Year of Lear next year, it would be too much to read both now.
I'm tempted to reread Macbeth since it's one of my favorite plays, but we'll see how September goes.
Btw, I love the thumbnail!😊
@@LanaCelebic Thank you! Of course you can’t read both of those books this month! That’s too much to take in all at once. But I do want to know what you think of the 1599 book when you finish it. 😃 Thanks for commenting! 💛🎭
This book sounds fascinating! I may put it on the list for Historathon next year!
Oh, I'd love to hear what you think of it! You'd probably find the history part of it much easier than I did! :) Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
Hi Kelly, hope you are having a great weekend! Thank you for another great review--you have given so many great recommendations, it's hard to keep up! I have never heard of the Shapiro books before, but these look interesting. I generally wasn't into reading history, but have become more open to the genre over time. Certainly, it can definitely add context and enhance understanding towards appreciating a work of art.
Currently, I am very slowly reading through an old school book of criticism from my father's collection, "Shakespearean Tragedy" by A.C. Bradley. He analyzes Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth and (I haven't read it yet) Antony and Cleopatra.
As an aside, not sure how much you love film, but Akira Kurosawa (the famous Japanese director) made at least two Shakespeare adaptations: "Throne of Blood" (influenced by Macbeth) and "Ran" (influenced by "King Lear"). Worth checking out (especially "Ran")....Best, Joe
Yes, Jason keeps talking to me about Throne of Blood and Ran, but I still haven't seen them. We don't own either of them, which is a bit shocking to me. We will get to them! I'm so glad that I'm giving you recommendations and I sincerely hope you enjoy them. I don't mind random comments so if you do read this book, I hope you'll feel free on any video of mine to tell me about your experience. I would love to know your thoughts! Thank you so much for watching and commenting!
I am very interested in The Year of Lear. Looks fascinating.
You should check this out! 💛
This was full of interesting nuggets. Thank you m
@@scallydandlingaboutthebook2711 I’m glad you enjoyed it! 💛
Got my copy of Year of the Lear yesterday. Looks great to me, though I've only read a few pages. It's such a big deal time in history, though. The Plague, King James bible, Guy Fawkes, and a significant expansion of theatre, though the Puritans shut that down a couple decades later :-( Thanks for the review and for hosting Shaketember.
Larry, thank you so much for watching and commenting on my video! I really appreciate it! I'd love to hear what you think when you finish reading it! There was SO MUCH going on, you are right. I had no idea. But this book really altered my perspective about what people were experiencing at that time. I look forward to hearing more of your thoughts!
@@booksimnotreading I just love what you, Jason, and Nicolle are doing with Shaketember. We need more Shakespeare events. I'll be happy to tell you what I think of Year of Lear if I can get it read soon. I'm going to try to sneak half an hour per day towards that goal but right now I'm up to my eye brows with "gotta reads." I'm reading Cymbeline and I've told Nicolle that I'm going to reread King Lear for Shaketember. I'd also like to get to Twelfth Night during the event. For each play I always review what Marjorie Garber (Shakespeare After All) and Harold Bloom (Invention of the Human) so I'm kinda-sorta busy with Shakespeare right now. Thanks again to all three of you for hosting this event.
Impressive review
Thank you, Stuart. That's so kind of you. I'm not sure that it's that impressive, but I hope you enjoyed the video. Guess what's coming soon (OK, soon might be stretching it, but it IS going to happen)??? Jason got all our music out!!! :)
@@booksimnotreading You're welcome. I did enjoy it. I look forward to seeing the video you and Jason do about your music
🎭🦋
@@barbaragallant609 💛🎭
✌️🙂
Apparently, Scotland was "trending" at this time lol
💛
I started writing a promised review of "Year of the Lear" but then realized that it had to fit into a TH-cam comment. So I started over, reducing my comments to, well, a comment.
I begin with reference to your comment that you really don't like reading histories. I think this is the plight of North American schooling, the same schooling that ruined Shakespeare and poetry for many of us. History, like Shakespeare is turned into dates and names, turning the subject into testable facts and all life drained from it.
But, there are history writers who tell stories and James Shapiro is one of them. If you read him as a story-teller rather than a historian, his work reads like Middlemarch, only he's talking about the Gunpowder Plot and King James' attempts to unify Great Britain rather than the political reforms that Ms Brooke is living through in Middlemarch.
He does "analyze" his stories as he relates events to Shakespeare's writing but, after all, that's why a book like Year of the Lear is called Year of the Lear :-) I loved this book and thank you for introducing it to me. Gaining a connection between Shakespeare's writing and what he was experiencing/reading is illuminating. I'm in the middle of Lear right now and Year of the Lear is playing in my mind as I do. It's making the complexity of Lear just a wee bit easier to follow and understand.
@@larrymarshall9454 Larry, this was great! I am so glad you enjoyed this book so much, and I do intend to read more of Shapiro in the future. I am reading Macbeth now and seeing all kinds of details that I hadn’t before. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with me! I hope you’ll stick around after Shaketember! 💛
@@booksimnotreading Sticking around for sure. Hope you guys do some more Shakespeare :-)