King Lear (Signet Classics) | 
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Product Description
Newly revised, this edition of "King Lear" features an extensive overview of Shakespeare's life and world; an editor's introduction; a note on the sources; dramatic criticism from the past and present; a comprehensive stage and screen history of notable actors, directors and productions; and more.
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Customer Reviews:
• Helpful 15 January, 2007
I have my degree in English... I like reading and teaching with this version as "help" not as a substitution. It gives a clearer understanding to Shakespeare for people who have difficulty with it.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1HOHFLALK686I
• Sir Alec Guiness's Bbc Radio Recording Of King Lear May Be Adequate For Those Familiar With This Great Play For Our Day 06 September, 2008
If you have already carefully read the play, and seen various presentations, this ancient BBC radio recording may prove an adequate and refreshing version. There are jarring interludes of Stravinsky-inspired music which may now seem anachronistic or otherwise out of place, rather than tragically atmospheric, but you may find as well redeeming qualities within this recording.
For one we do not find the monotone reedy Guiness voice familiar from his films, but a broad spectrumed and robust rendition of the mighty (and tragic) character of Lear. I find nevertheless the voicings of the Fool unfortunately most often nearly indistinguishable from the young gentlemen, and the voicings of the royal women barely distinguishable one from the other, even Cordelia. Although this may seem a prerequisite for any radio presentation in which only aural cues are possible, anyone reading along, for instance in the venerable and traditional and reliable King Lear (Arden Shakespeare) edition, or intimately familiar with this ancient fable may be able to distinguish well who speaks when. Otherwise it can grow incomprehensibly, dismayingly, even discouragingly confusing.
Thus you may find here an adequate aural presentation of this play. You may also wish to hear the great Paul Scofield as King Lear (Naxos AudioBooks). Audio recordings by Gielgud, etc. are also available, but this serves as a good place to start and not too greatly eviscerated, even if our eyes are plucked out and we must hear only, nosing our way to Dover. Certainly an excellent tragedy to revisit as we find a mad old man approaching the throne and a woman in the waiting.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1FDV3WPOHREY9
• The Bbc Radio Gielgud Audiobook Is Not Abridged But First Folio Only Like The Naxos 03 October, 2008
The only thing which mars this otherwise excellent Bantam Doubleday Dell Audio Publishing Renaissance Theatre Company King Lear with Sir John Gielgud (in around 1993), Dame Judith (formerly Judi) Dench, Bob Hoskins, Kenneth Brannagh, DEREK JACOBI, etc. is that following the academic fashion of that moment, it is First Folio only.
It is NOT abridged as indicated on the amazon product page. It is First Folio only. Otherwise it is overwhelming and excellent and demanding of repeated listenings.
For this reason alone the best recording we have available is the Caedmon recording King Lear in the Quarto or conflated version with the earlier Paul Scofield. Notice this is not the later Naxos Scofield recording King Lear (Naxos AudioBooks), which is most lamentably like this Gielgud, First Folio only.
The producers of these late recordings by Scofield and Gielgud wasted their final talent and experience doing a then currently academically correct First Folio-only recording. In the 36 page booklet which accompanies this Gielgud recording, the long experienced Fool, Michael Williams mentions politely that his best lines are cut. THe first brotherly banter between Edmund and Edgar (with the greatest joke in Shakespeare: "Since when are you a sectary astronomical?" Edgar's only joke) is lost, severely marring the play, as well as the enacting of a trial for the sisters in the straw hut: "I mistook you for a joint stool!" The Fool's best line: cut!
Basically the brochure enclosed reports no more than the fact this is First Folio only, and pages of bios of the actors and director with reflections on their performance. Cornwall at the time of this recording was presenting the part of Lear and wonders at Gielgud saying HIS lines. Also in the brochure are some overwrought black and white photos of earnest looking actors, and a few refreshing comments by Bob Hoskins and the Fool. Derek Jacobi has no comment.
I got two copies of this recording when I discovered my first purchase had no brochure. This head-shot brochure is not necessary for appreciation of the recording, but now I happily have a copy for the home and for the truck, without danger of the precautioned and unwanted FBI interference for illegal copying. May God bless amazon.com!
What a cast! Derek Jacobi (he of I, Claudius, of the saintly medical Brother Cadfael: Monk's Hook, The Leper of St. Giles, The Sanctuary Sparrow, One Corpse Too Many and of the mobster Duke in Mr. Alex Cox's Revengers Tragedy) presents an interesting if brief King of France, for once with a French accent which nevertheless occasionally slips into a Bela Lugosi imitation.
Bob Hoskins, best known here only for Who Framed Roger Rabbit, presents an interestingly husky Oswald, normally played as a weak courtier, here with a fresh take altogether, very effectively. It is worth hearing him, if only for his native cockney, but moreso for his excellent presentation of the otherwise despicable Oswald.
Dame Judith Dench is strong of course as Goneril, and strives to flesh out her evil role, as she describes in the brochure. Dench may be remembered from Macbeth / McKellen, Dench (Thames Shakespeare Collection) and Shakespeare in Love (Miramax Collector's Series), William Shakespeare's Hamlet (Two-Disc Special Edition) by Kenneth Branagh, etc., etc., etc.
Kenneth Branagh is well known for his numerous films of Shakespeare, as well as Mary Shelley's FRANKENSTEIN (1994) - WIDESCREEN VERSION! - Rare Original DVD release! - Branagh, De Niro and Woody Allen's Celebrity in which he plays Mr. Allen.
Sir John Gielgud, the magnificent, the greatest, is unfortunately, tragically, perhaps only known here for 10 as Dudley Moore's butler. He may also be seen in William Shakespear's Julius Caesar The Shaw Collection (Pygmalion / The Millionairess / Arms and the Man / The Devil's Disciple / Mrs. Warren's Profession / Heartbreak House), etc. Please read his Gielgud: An Actor and His Time: A Memoir.
In the Scofield recordings we hear the usual weary Paul Scofield playing King Lear.
Here we hear Lear, Lear alone, LEar entirely, as Gielgud IS Lear, in all his fullness.
If only the script enjoyed all of ITS fullness, with the First Quarto, and not just the First Folio version which had been censored for the royal censors of its day, excluding therefore the Fool's jokes about a monopoly on foolishness, as King James corruptly passed out monopolies to his favorites. If only the producers had taken Sir John for all he had done for sixty years upon the stage, and turned him loose, and not straitjacketed by First Folio-ness.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A3FHCCQ588R7CD
• Great Ideas--but Beware! 10 November, 2006
I bought this edition as a teaching supplement, not realizing that it is the folio version of the play. The words "quarto" and "folio" refer to the size of the pages in the two editions. Many secondary schools and universities use the quarto edition and a lot is left out of the folio--this version cuts out three hundred lines and adds one hundred new ones. The effect is that it alters the way the characters are shown. If you are reading the play with a class and they have a quarto version, while you are using your trusty teacher's Cambridge, chances are there will be a lot of blank expressions and confusion on their faces. The lines they see will not jibe with yours. The extra articles and class activities are great though--just make sure that if you use the Cambridge, you have your students buy only folio editions.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AFUGL4FFHE394
• Review Of The Signet Edition Of Shakespeare's "king Lear" 10 April, 2008
This paperback is a handy edition of Shakespeare's great play, useful for students on all levels. The critical essays in the back are helpful, though one or two more recent ones could have been included.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AW8K6G5ULT865
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