Book Review: TL;DR Shakespeare (summaries of his plays)(OT)

TL;DR Shakespeare, by SparkNotes (Spark Notes, 2022, $14.99, 96pp) Review by Skye Anderson 

TL;DR? LOL?

At last I know what TL;DR means! Like LOL which some thought meant Lots of Luck when it really means Laughing out Loud, Tl;DR actually means Too Long; Didn't Read!

I have been an amateur Shakespeare aficionado since the age of 12: I try to like his plays and I keep trying, which is why I picked up this very colorful little book.

Six Comedies, Six Tragedies: Organized

One of two TL;DR books (the other being Literature* - 13 modern classics), this is a keeper for any student in high school or college or for any self-learner. Since it can be difficult for an amateur (non-English major) to understand poetry written hundreds of years ago, Notes can help explain Shakespeare for you. It would make a great gift for a 12-year-old to read over the summer and decide which of the plays to really start with.

Each play has a 6-page spread starting with illustrations of the characters, with the genre, setting and 'year first performed.' Next comes the summary (plot overview with rising action, climax, falling action and major conflict )

followed by a page of more main characters (more than before) and their relationships, themes and a quote,

closing with the key question and answer, and finally, 'What Does the Ending Mean'?

This TL;DR book also contains half-page synopses of 9 other comedies, 6 tragedies and 11 histories in addition to the six comedies and six tragedies.

What Would I Change?

A few things: first, some pages had backgrounds of such dark colors like blue that the print was difficult to read. And, like Russian novels of several hundred pages spanning decades, this book of summaries tries to include everything so that you don't remember the characters' names after reading the one paragraph synopsis.

However, I can't wait to get the other TL;DR book - Literature!

*includes To Kill a Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies, Catcher in the Rye, The Handmaid's Tale, The Things They Carried, Of Mice and Men, 1984, Fahrenheit 451 and more