WILL IN THE WORLD: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare -- Stephen Greenblatt

W.W. Norton & Company -- tpb
New York -- ©2004 -- 407pp
ISBN: 0-393-32737-x

Bringing together little-known historical facts and little-noticed elements of Shakespeare's plays, Greenblatt makes inspired connections between the life and the works and delivers "a dazzling and subtle biography" (Richard Lacayo, Time). Readers will experience Shakespeare's vital plays again as if for the first time, but with greater understanding and appreciation of their extraordinary depth and humanity.

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A very read-able book.

Most people familiar with literature are aware that despite being an incredibly popular writer, Shakespeare left very little information about himself. Here, Greenblatt accumulates all the previously written information about Shakespeare and combines it with a well researched history of the era. He draws likely scenarios (for instance: it is likely that as a young boy, Shakespeare attended a performance of a morality play by a traveling company -- Will's father was bailiff (mayor) of Stratford and ordered payment to be made to two traveling theatrical companies. The first performance, known as the Mayor's Play, was one in which the bailiff was expected to attend. Records show that in other similar situations, the children of the bailiff were often in attendance. Hence, likely that Will had been exposed to theatre at this time).

Greenblatt makes a good argument in all cases and even debunks a few previously alluded-to scenarios, offered by other writers.

We still can't know for certain how Will Shakespeare lived and loved, but we can continue to draw likely situations based on the history of the era that we do know. This book does it as well as any that I've read.

TOPDOG/UNDERDOG -- Suzan-Lori Parks

Theatre Communication Group -- tpb
New York -- 1999 -- 109pp
ISBN: 1-55936-201-4

The play tells the story of Lincoln and Booth, two brothers whose names were given to them as a joke, foretelling a lifetime of sibling rivalry and resentment. Haunted by the past, the brothers are forced to confront the shattering reality of their future. [from Amazon.com]


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Generally I've been surprisingly impressed with the Pulitzer Prize winning dramas. Often I find major award winning writing to be over-hype crap. The Pulizter's for drama that I have read have been pleasant gems. Until now.

This 2002 award winner, is the story of two African-American brothers (Lincoln and Booth), sorting out their lives. They hustle, steal, con, and try to work legitimate-but-low-paying jobs. Their past is nearly as amorphous as their future.

One of the ways in which I rate plays is by thinking on how much I would like to see it staged. As a play, it is meant to be seen, rather than read. This play, I have absolutely no desire to see. I can't imagine it being done somwhere and my thinking, "Oh, I'd like to see that." There is nothing about these characters or their situation that I can relate to, find appealing or even interesting, or desire to learn more about.

As a printed work, it's difficult to completely review this as something 'to be staged' and I can't help but review this as a written work. And here I have an even greater problem. As with so many big prize winning writers, this author has decided that she doesn't need to follow convention. "The" is "thuh" and "your" is "yr" and a contraction apostrophe...!?...forget it. And of course, why bother to write "(Pause.)" or "(Beat.)" as every other playwright is taught to do? Instead she lists the character's name, followed by no dialogue ... to suggest that they aren't saying anything.

I have decided that breaking convention/being unconventional is a sure way to get noticed by awards committees. Still, it would only bother me slightly if there was a story worth reading/seeing.

I am not familiar with either of the other two plays that were nominated for the Pulitzer in 2002, but I am much more curious now to compare them to the winner.

REPLAY -- Sharon Creech

Scholastic -- hc
New York -- 2005 --180pp
ISBN: 0-439-85861-5


A young boy feels invisible in his large, expressive family and hopes that his life on stage will bring him fame and fortune (or at least attention).

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I enjoy reading children's books. I have a lot of respect for most Newbery Award-Winning authors. I love the theatre. This should all combine to high marks for Sharon Creech's Replay, but it doesn't.

Creech does an admirable job combining the elements, but she forgot to focus on what the book is about.

Leo feels invisible in his family. Leo fantasizes about himself as hero in nearly every situation imaginable. Leo learns about his father as a boy. Leo learns about a lost family member. Leo learns that there is more to a person than just what he sees on the surface.

This last is probably the over-riding element in the book, but it gets lost amid too much other 'stuff.'

The switching in and out of the fantasy-Leo certainly adds something to the character ... what youngster doesn't imagine him/herself as the hero of any moment? ... but it really isn't important to the story. The main element is carried through as Leo discovers and reads his father's biography, written at the age of 13. It is underscored by his (Leo's) creating a back-story for his stage character, and it is punctuated by the discovery of a missing family member.

Unfortunately, none of these elements are built upon properly and instead of wonderful discoveries, the book peters out to a whimper.

Not a great showing by Sharon Creech

GYPSY WORLD (STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE #7) -- Ted Pedersen

A Minstrel Book -- tpb
New York -- ©1996 -- 114pp
ISBN: 0-671-51115-7
illustrations by Todd Cameron Hamilton

The Fjori star trader Orak is strictly off-limits as it docks at the repair bay on Deep Space Nine, but Jake and Nog can't resist the challenge of stealing a look at the Fjori star maps and trying to find the secret Fjori home planet, Eden. They find themselves trapped in the starship, hurtling though uncharted space. If they set foot on the forbidden planet, they'll be forced to stay for life. Their only hope is Vija, a Fjorian girl who asks the Council of Elders to let Jake and Nog attempt the perilous Rite of Passage in order to win their freedom.

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I totally understand trying to capitalize on a popular franchise, such as Star Trek (and all it's incarnations), but the problem with a book like this is that it necessarily features two incredibly dull characters from the series.

A knowledge of these characters is necessary as there is no character building/description in the book. This prevents the random reader from picking up and enjoying this kind of book.

The other problem with a book such as this is that it requires a moral ... a lesson learned for that young reader. In the better books I've read that lesson is well woven into the story. Here it is worn on the shirt-sleeve. The reader is practically hit over the head with the good-deeds-win-out lesson, and the sudden switch from jerk to friend by the guest villian du jour.

Not a recommended book by any means.

DOGG'S HAMLET, CAHOOT'S MACBETH -- Tom Stoppard

Samuel French, Inc -- playscript
New York -- ©1979 -- 83pp
ISBN: 0-573-60046-5
Full-length play; two one-act plays

This clever romp is two short plays. In the first, a troupe of English schoolboys (played by adults) speak in a mock language called "Dogg." This hilarious language babbles along until the schoolboys, who are studying Shakespeare's "foreign" language, present an incredibly funny 15 minute version of Hamlet and then encore with a two minute version! The second play, dedicated to dissident Czech dramatist Pavel Kohout, is about a performance of Macbeth he and his friends once staged in a living room since the government banned public performances. The action shifts between the bare stage and the police inquiry. The murder and intrigue of Shakespeare's play are juxtaposed with the Czech political harassment.

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I thought I knew this (these?) play(s), but having now read them, I realize that I've only seen a popular cutting from the Dogg's Hamlet section.

This play (actually two one acts, but they really do rely on one another to create a full play) is really rather unique and complicated. It is both hysterically funny and frighteningly intense. It is witty and clever, it incorporates two great Shakespeare plays quite well.

Of course I laughed through the beginning section of Dogg's Hamlet, but I didn't quite 'get' the transition to the Hamlet rehearsal/performance.

The "Cahoot" section was intriquingly intense, which let's up with the return of a "Dogg's" character.

I give this only three stars because, as literature to read, it is difficult and perhaps confusing. As theatre, this could be a really fun production in the hands of a director who has really explored it. I'd love to see this staged, fully....

SMILES TO GO -- Jerry Spinelli

Joanna Cotler Books -- hc
New York -- ©2008 -- 248pp
ISBN: 978-0-06-028133-5

A high school freshman and science geek struggles with all the normal trials for his age (mainly, girls [one in particular] and friends who are more popular) but everything is more complicated when he learns that nothing ... NOTHING ... lasts forever.

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Jerry Spinelli has an uncanny knack for capturing me in his books.

Okay, perhaps that's a bit extreme, and certainly quite self-indulgent, but the truth is, I recognized traits in the main character that I most certainly displayed when I was that age. Chances are that boys that age today recognize themselves too.

I was able to read this book in one sitting. Not because it was an easy read (it wasn't too difficult, though), but because it held my interest ... I wanted to keep reading. I wanted to see what happened next. It's definitely well written and it would be easy for a reader to get caught up in it.

But even with that ringing endorsement, I can't quite give it five stars.

I don't mind leaving a book with questions unanswered. But I don't like getting to the end of a book to discover that the direction the author was going in is suddenly changed. Deviating from the path is okay, but changing the rules of a game is not. The ending comes quite suddenly, with a curveball at the reader so severe that we couldn't possibly see it coming -- and it changes what the book is about.

This boys' exploration of love, death, friendship, eternity, and the discovery that what he thought he knew to be true, wasn't, suddenly becomes a book about family. It turns the outside, inside, and really, what we spent 150 pages reading, doesn't matter anymore. But it should. Even a new discovery about something personal, something famil-iar, should still have it's connections with what's gone before.

Yes, there are hints at this throughout. I realize that. But the hints aren't strong enough to be taken seriously, and at least one part of the discovery, which is rather important, is TOLD to us, by another character (I'm trying very hard not to create spoilers) -- there is no way that our character, or we, could have discovered it without being directly informed. It's kind of a cheap way out (and the drama of the near-ending is a bit over-done), and for that, I take away one star. ...a four-star book.

THE BLACK THRONE -- Roger Zelazny and Fred Saberhagen

Baen Books -- hc (book club edition)
New York -- ©1990 -- 278pp
no ISBN - book club edition

An alternate history story, featuring Edgar Allen Poe ... possibly explaining why he was so tormented (he was living in the wrong dimension, having been switched with Edgar Allen Perry). Perry takes up the story, trying to right the dimensional discrepencies with the help of Annie, the powerful woman who created the rift though was duped into doing so by men seeking the secrets of alchemy.

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I admit that I struggled some with this book at the beginning, but I believe that this is because Zelazny tends to start a story right in the middle, forcing the reader to catch up to him.

I am not at all familiar with Fred Saberhagen, so I'm not sure what his influences are with this book.

Once I was caught up with the story, this was the type of read that is difficult to put down. I always wanted to read 'just one more chapter.'

Although the book managed to hold my interest through to the end, the last quarter or so seemed to get bogged down. I actually wondered if perhaps the authors traded off chapters and each wanted to add his own mark to the tale, although they both lacked necessity in telling the tale.

Some chapters spanned a few minutes ... the action being 'real time' and some chapters took place over several months. The inconsistency was always jarring.

I liked it well enough... reading Zelazny is like luscious, literary fruit ...but it failed to tell the story cohesively for me.

WHISPERS -- Stuart David Schiff, editor

Doubleday & Company -- hc
New York -- ©1977 -- 226pp
ISBN: 0-385-12568-2
illustrations by: Stephen Fabian, Lee Brown Coye, Mike Garcia, Tim Kirk, Frank Utpatel, George Barr

A collection of short stories, most of which appeared in the magazine, Whispers.

"Sticks" - Karl Edward Wagner
"The Barrow Troll" - David Drake
"The Glove" - Fritz Leiber
"The Closer of the Way" - Robert Bloch
"Dark Winner" - William F. Nolan
"Ladies in Waiting" - Hugh B. Cave
"White Moon Rising" - Dennis Etchison
"Graduation" - Richard Christian Matheson
"Mirror, Mirror" - Ray Russell
"The House of Cthulhu" - Brian Lumley
"Antiquities" - John Crowley
"A Weather Report From the Top of the Stairs" - James Sallis and David Lunde
"The Scallion Stone" - Basil A. Smith
"The Inglorious Rise of the Catsmeat Man" - Robin Smyth
"The Pawnshop" - Charles E. Fritch
"Le Miroir" - Robert Aickman
"The Willow Platform" - Joseph Payne Brennan
"The Dakwa" - Manly Wade Wellman
"Goat" - David Campton
"The Chimney" - Ramsey Campbell

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It's been a while since I read a collection of horror tales, and this was a nice sampling. Standouts, for me, were David Campton's "Goat," and Fritch's "The Pawnshop" and Wagner's "Sticks." Each of them seemed the most compelling, realistic, and horrific in their own way. Robin Smyth's "...Catsmeat Man" was also quite intriquing. Seemed like it could have been the impetus for "Sweeny Todd" but I suppose the idea of a butcher cutting up people has been around for a long time.

None of the stories were horrible, which shows that Schiff has done a good job of putting together this collection.

"Weather Report from the Top of The Stairs" was my least favorite in this collection. The story, written, based on a cartoon by Gahan Wilson, included two endings...the original by the authors and a rewrite (change of maybe two words?) at the request of the editor and cartoonist. Even with the variation, it lacked the meat that Wilson's fabulous cartoons manage to have.

A fun trip into the speculative/horror world.

GRAVITY BUSTER: JOURNAL#2 OF A CARDBOARD GENIUS -- Frank Asch

Kids Can Press -- hc
Tonawanda, NY -- ©2007 -- 143pp
ISBN: 1-55453-068-7

A young boy plans to pilot his cardboard spaceship to the stars, with his favorite female friend as a co-pilot, but first he must over-come his younger brother's nuisances.

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This looked like a book that my son might like, so I checked it out from the library and gave it a quick read.

I liked the idea, but not the execution.

A young boy-inventor, creating great magical (scientific) devices from ordinary household items, including cardboard boxes, is genius. What boy hasn't done this?! But there was too much focus on the sibling relationship and the hope of getting the girl ... a friend, not a girl-friend! ... to join him.

For such a short, quick book (144 pages, but large type and plenty of illustrations) it tried to do too much.

My son said it was "okay" and I agree.

ABSURDISTAN - Gary Shteyngart

Random House -- tpb
New York -- ©2006 -- 333pp
ISBN: 978-0-8129-7

An obese Russian Jew looks for love and happiness in a world mostly set against him.

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According to the New York Times, this is one of the ten best books of the year. What a sad year for literature was 2007!

I wanted very much to like this, and there were moments when I smiled at a phrase or passage or even a bit of biting satire, but over-all this was nothing more than literary masturbation ... an author trying to show off how clever he is rather than actually engaging a reader in a story. And, quite frankly, the story doesn't even begin until nearly a third of the way into the book.

I'm no prude when it comes to literature, but I definitely didn't need so much of the obese man's sex life told to me so often and in such detail. Is it funny, once, that such a fat man describes his trials at love-making? Maybe. Is it funny that we have to revisit that over and over? No.

I loved the idea of a country, Absurdisvani, with no more oil and over-looked by the U.S., throwing the wool over Hallibutron's eyes and lying about their oil reserves. This is the story. This is what could have been a great satirical novel. Even focusing on a single individual such as the obese Misha Vainberg, the son of a Russian Jew, could have worked, but it wasn't the story of Absurdistan, it was the story of an obese, spoiled, rich, Russian Jew looking for some meaning in his life. I guess I should have known (remembered) that when the first sentence of the prologue reads, "This is a book about love."

I never cared about Misha, and thus I never cared about his life.

TRAVESTIES - Tom Stoppard

Grove Press - tpb
New York - 1975 - 71pp
ISBN: 0-8021-5089-6
two act play

The fantastical meeting of James Joyce, Dadist founder Tristan Tzara, and Lenin as only someone like Tom Stoppard can tell it.

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This is a moderately difficult book to read, but as is the case with a play, it is meant to be seen, not necessarily just read.

I had to work very hard at visualizing this, putting myself in the roles of both audience member and director. When I was able to do that (I wasn't always consistent with this) I found that I greatly enjoyed the interaction between the characters.

I'm not at all familiar with the works of James Joyce (or Lenin or Tristan Tzara for that matter), but I liked the character as presented and would assume this to be an enjoyable role for a performer and a delight to watch.

I don't recommend this as a book to read, but a good production would likely be a real treat.

STAR TREK 2 - James Blish

Bantam Books -- pb
New York -- ©1968/11th printing 1972 -- 122p
(so old no ISBN number)


A collection of short stories based on original episodes of the classic television show, Star Trek. Episodes (and their original authors):

Arena (Gene L. Coon)
A Taste of Armageddon (Robert Hamner and Gene L. Coon)
Tomorrow Is Yesterday (D.C. Fontana)
Errand of Mercy (Gene L. Coon)
Court Martial (Don M. Mankiewicz and Steven W. Carabatsos)
Operation--Annihilate! (Steven W. Carabatsos)
City on the Edge of Forever (Harlan Ellison)
Space Seed (Carey Wilber and Gene L. Coon)

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Nostalgia.

Opening this book brings me back to the very first time I read this -- back in the very early 1970's. (This particular copy is the 11th printing and still it has no ISBN number.) Back to a time when I had to rely on the local television station to broadcast old Star Trek episodes in order to watch them. There were no DVDs or even VCR tapes. You couldn't record them (only by audio cassette). So these printed stories were little nuggets of gold to fanatical young Trekkers such as myself.

Reading these now I still get somewhat the same kick. Occassionally Blish embellished his stories with a little more insight into what motivated some of the characters. This is appreciated and enjoyable.

Though perhaps just as often, the stories raced through the plot, leaving out some of the finer details. The retelling of "Space Seed" fits this latter. There seems to be no threat from Khan, but suddenly he has his entire crew aboard the Enterprise and is holding the entire crew hostage and then just as suddenly, Kirk has regained control. The battle between men, between leaders, between centuries, never takes place as it does in the episode.

And while this was enjoyable and I'll probably reread all the books in this series, I'm still more likely to throw a DVD in the machine and watch an episode.

RABBIT HOLE -- David Lindsay-Abaire

Theatre Communications Group -- tpb
New York -- ©2006 -- 157pp
ISBN: 978-1-55936-290-0
Two Act Play
2007 Pulitzer Prize for Drama

A drama of a family grieving and trying to come to terms with life after the accidental death of their four year old son.

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So much anticipation when I started out to read this. So many glowing reviews, a Pulitzer Prize, a very good playwright... and I finished it with a sighed, "Eh."

The writing was crisp, clear. The characters seemed to be real people working through grief in their idividual ways. And that, is what the play is about...how we work through grief, to keep living when a loved one isn't.

Of course the loved one had to be a child. The grief for a child is so much more different than the grief for a parent.

But as I read this, I couldn't help but wonder why I was reading it. Why would I want to see this? I don't think that it explored anything new, or even touched on anything old in a new way.

It was, as many have labeled it, a slice of realism. But why is that important? I can stop in at the local church during a funeral to see realism. I can walk through my home town the day after the flood and experience the realism of grief.

This play didn't do anything for me. Sorry

PLAUTUS: THREE COMEDIES -- Titus Maccius Plautus

Translated (and with an introduction and notes) by Erich Segal
Bantam Books -- pb
New York -- 1969 --298pp
ISBN: 0-553-21169-2

Three rollicking funny plays from about 200 B.C.

The Braggart Soldier
The Brothers Menaechmus
The Haunted House

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I am so incredibly impressed with the Roman comedies. Whether Plautus or Menander, these authors knew what was funny. And in looking back on it, we learn that what is truy funny, stands the test of time. Good humor is based on the human condition, and that hasn't changed much over the centuries.

Translator, Erich Segal, does a fantastic job of keeping the meaning and style and rhythm of the lines, as well as the alliteration.

It can be a difficult trap, reading verse, but when one makes the effort to ignore the rhyme and focus on content, the results are well worth the read. I consider myself to be pretty adept at reading verse plays, but I noticed more than once that I had fallen into the trap of reading the rhyme and lost the sense of what I was reading and had to backtrack.

Of the plays themselves, The Braggart Soldier and The Brothers Menaechmus had me the most interested.

I mentioned the human condition and how it hasn't changed much. Take for example, this humorous section from The Braggart Soldier in which the slave Palaestrio talks to the old man Periplectomenus about marriage. The old man is dead set against it:

Per: Mine's the house of freedom --I am free-- I live my life for me./Thank
the gods, I'm rich enough. I could've married very well,/ Could've led a
wealthy wife of high position to the altar,/ But I wouldn't want to lead a
barking dog into my house!

Pal: Yet remember -- children can be pleasant -- and it's fun to breed
'em.

Per: You can breed 'em, give me freedom! That, by Hercules, is fun!

...

I'd be glad to marry someonewho would turn to me and ask me,/ "Dearest
husband, buy some wool, so I can make some clothes for you,/ First a tunic, soft
and warm, and then a cloak for winter weather,/ So you won't be
cold. " You'd never hear a wife say things like that!/ Why, before
the cock would crow, she'd shake me from my sleep and say,/ "Husband! Give
me money for a New Year's gift to give my mother!..."

And in The Brother Menaechmus, Menaechmus leaves his house and shrewish wife to hopefully visit his lover and he says:

However often I try to go out you detain me, delay me, demand such details
as/ Where I'm going, what I'm doing, what's my business all about,/ Deals I'm
making, undertaking, what I did when I was out./ I don't have a wife, I have a
customs office bureaucrat,/ For I must declare the things I've done, I'm doing,
and all that!

And even The Haunted House has a chacater make an aside: "Haven't you got smelly wives whose only perfume is their dowry?"

It would seem, from these great plays, that sex, fidelity, infidelity, and the desire to have the best of both worlds (a stable home life and the ability to sleep with anyone/anytime) is as timeless as written history.

Briefly, The Braggart Soldier is about just that... a soldier who considers himself beyond compare. He is given his one-upance by his slave who manages to trick the soldier out of the beautiful woman by convincing him that she has a twin and he drops her for her false sister.

The Brothers Menaechmus is about, as expected, a set of twins, both named Menaechmus (they were separated at birth and the caretakers for each thought that they had the chjild named Menaechmus). One is married and living in town and dallying with his girlfriend at every chance. The other just arrives in town and is confused for the local, which of course only creates more confusions.

The Haunted House is so named because the son and slave try to trick the father/master out of coming back into his house, telling him it is haunted, when in reality he is using it as a massive party house.

All fantastic and well worth reading. If only more schools and theatres would perform these hilarious classics!

RIVERS WEST -- Louis L'Amour

Bantam Book -- pb
New York -- ©1975 -- 179pp
ISBN: 0-553-25436-7

When a young ship-builder stumbles upon a dying man, he also stumbles upon a plot to take over the western frontier. A beautiful woman leads the charge against the nefarious plot.

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Although I don't generally admit it in casual conversation, I believe that I own nearly every Louis L'Amour book out there.

Louis L'Amour was not a great writer, but he was a good storyteller. He knew how to craft a story that keeps your interest as you read. Usually.

This particular book was work for me. It took three or four chapters before I felt interested enough in the main character, and then I struggled to keep caring. Also, whether it's unique to this particular book or common in L'Amour books, I'm not sure, but there was an awful lot of lucky coincidence that kept our main hero moving forward in his goal. In this particular book, he was left for dead in the river, but by coincidence he was picked up by a friendly gentleman in a small craft at the last possible moment. And by lucky coincidence, that gentlemen had some information that would prove to be useful in the hero's quest. And so it goes.

I've also decided that I'm a little tired of L'Amour's need to have a boxing scene in his novels. His wiry, smaller heros always seemed to have great skill with the fists and are able to take down the local, undefeated Goliaths.

It wasn't a terrible read, but it didn't capture me like other L'Amour novels have