Books in Brief

The Living World of Shakespeare, by John Wain (St. Martin’s, $5.95). This book—meant to introduce the general reader to the plays (though many are not treated, including six of the first eight comedies)—is just what one fears in such introductions. Travelogue-solicitous: “we take leave of the tragedies, and turn with a new sense of expectation towards the masterpieces that are still to come.” Cute: a cynic (its etymology given in Greek characters, but without the accent) “will lift up his leg and make water on anything.” Breezy: Timon says “something rather bracing”; Cymbeline’s “manner is far out.” Breathlessly summary: to form a chapter to go with those on the histories, comedies, tragedies, and romances, Wain lumps together Romeo, Troilus, Othello, and Antony as “love plays.” Condescending: Lady Macbeth is “the little fool.” Obvious: “Macbeth is a brilliant demonstration of Shakespeare’s prowess as a writer.” Apologetic: he tries to acquit Iago and Edmund of the charge of being villains. Biographical: we are told at what lines Shakespeare became nervous, confident, overwrought, or intent on revealing his own homosexuality (when he gives it to Antonio as his “taint”). Reflecting the last-fad-but-one (in this case image-counting) : to get another “mud image,” Wain makes Cleopatra, in her speech on death’s sleep, say that suicide no longer palates the nurse’s dung (instead of Theobald’s emendation to “dug”). And, of course, wrong: Wain thinks that Claudius addresses his lines on the divinity of kings to Hamlet, that Hamlet speaks “A little more than kin . . .” while coming onstage, and that Othello was written before Measure for Measure; he does not understand the theological concepts of divine right (which he confuses with infallibility) or murder (which he has Hamlet pere confuse with killing). G. wills

SOLUTION TO LAST ISSUE’S TRANS-O-GRAM (December 15) O. Henry THE GIFT OF THE MAGI

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The Living World of Shakespeare, by John Wain (St. Martin’s, $5.95). This book—meant to introduce the general reader to the plays (though many are not treated, including six of the first eight comedies)—is just what one fears in such introductions. Travelogue-solicitous: “we take leave of the tragedies, and turn with a new sense of expectation towards the masterpieces that are still to come.” Cute: a cynic (its etymology given in Greek characters, but without the accent) “will lift up his leg and make water on anything.” Breezy: Timon says “something rather bracing”; Cymbeline’s “manner is far out.” Breathlessly summary: to form a chapter to go with those on the histories, comedies, tragedies, and romances, Wain lumps together Romeo, Troilus, Othello, and Antony as “love plays.” Condescending: Lady Macbeth is “the little fool.” Obvious: “Macbeth is a brilliant demonstration of Shakespeare’s prowess as a writer.” Apologetic: he tries to acquit Iago and Edmund of the charge of being villains. Biographical: we are told at what lines Shakespeare became nervous, confident, overwrought, or intent on revealing his own homosexuality (when he gives it to Antonio as his “taint”). Reflecting the last-fad-but-one (in this case image-counting) : to get another “mud image,” Wain makes Cleopatra, in her speech on death’s sleep, say that suicide no longer palates the nurse’s dung (instead of Theobald’s emendation to “dug”). And, of course, wrong: Wain thinks that Claudius addresses his lines on the divinity of kings to Hamlet, that Hamlet speaks “A little more than kin . . .” while coming onstage, and that Othello was written before Measure for Measure; he does not understand the theological concepts of divine right (which he confuses with infallibility) or murder (which he has Hamlet pere confuse with killing). G. wills

SOLUTION TO LAST ISSUE’S TRANS-O-GRAM (December 15) O. Henry THE GIFT OF THE MAGI