![]() But more than that, the Lambs make a point of retaining much of Shakespeare’s language. It is all there-pain, heartbreak, human longing, disaster. What I now find compelling about Tales from Shakespeare is the sophistication of the stories-at no time do the Lambs (Charles taking the tragedies, Mary the comedies and romances) condescend to their young readers. ![]() Children can be cruel, especially to thin, bespectacled boys who purport to read Shakespeare. When word got out among my peers, the ridicule and taunting were unceasing. ![]() ![]() Those magical stories provided great pleasure and set me happily upon hours of daydreaming-shouldn’t every children’s book do just that? There was, however, one drawback to my enthusiasms. These days, it is to the colossal tragedies- Lear, Macbeth, Hamlet, Antony and Cleopatra-that I return time and again, but back then, A Midsummer Night’s Dream seemed more beguiling. ![]() The prose was a bit beyond me at the time, though I did find the illustrations enchanting: Who was this Nick Bottom, with an ass’s head firmly affixed to his own? Soon, I grew into its prose, and the book became a favorite (replacing D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths, which had had no less an influence on my imagination). When I was a boy of seven or eight, my father brought home a copy of Charles and Mary Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare-retellings of several of the Bard’s plays for children. ![]()
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