Rating: 
Summary: Great for the Ritual
Review: My favorite part of acting are the the little rituals that ALL actors have. As a young actor, and one who hopes to focus mainly on the classical stage, my most important ritual is reading the play for the first time, unencumbered by ideas of "How am I going to do this?" I like to sit with a nice stogie and a drink and read the thing for all that's there. Not just my part. That being said. I love this edition of Shakespeare more than any other. It seems to me to be fairly close to the first folio and has a good deal of notes, while not too intrusive in the flow of reading. It feels like a great religious tome. And I hauled it all over London for a summer for an added workout. Great!!
Rating: 
Summary: Take you to a place you've never been, and makes you feel...
Review: Personally it was a little heavy, unmetaphorically speaking that is
Rating:
Summary: That is Shakespeare -
Review: The dramatist - the poet - he whose quill would pulse as he wrote and fill with a blush of blue, like a bruised nail. His verses, reader, his verses open out like flowers of glass, and at their center, between the brittle petals lies a pool of indigo, translucent and as huge as doom. His voice is unmuffled - it is like a bell, clearly ringing in the night of our confusion; but the clarity is the clarity of imponderable depth - depth - so that his lines float on for evermore, reader - on and on and on, for evermore. That is Shakespeare...Shakespeare.
Rating: 
Summary: Lousy format spoils otherwise good edition
Review: This book has useful (though not terribly complete) introductions to each of the plays, focusing mainly on comparing various Folio and Quarto editions of the plays. It also contains some nice pictures, though I wish the Latin in them were translated or shown at a legible size. It has very nice appendicies nothing the first appearances of all the characters in the plays, and a timeline showing what historical events were occuring in relation to works written by Shakespeare and events in his life, as well as to plays by other playwrights and other literature produced at that time. The pages are relatively thin and the print small. However (this referes to the '74 edition, maybe they have changed it since then) the plays are a royal pain to read. The pages are about a foot high and the notes are at the bottom. There is no marking to indicate whether a line has a note, so the reader must read a line or two, glance down at the notes, read another few lines, look at the notes again, and so on. Were it not for this major annoyance, this would be a very good (and very complete) edition of Shakespeare's works.
Rating:
Summary: The Complete Guide to Bardolatry
Review: This book is one of the best examples of a "complete works of Shakespeare" on the market. It is a perfect gift for anyone already interested in the Bard or someone seeking to better acquaint themselves with his works. The footnotes are helpful and appropriate, while the introductions provide valuable insights into the various works. Even if you don't need the footnotes, this book is a must have if you're interested in the history surrounding Shakespeare's writings and the printings of his works. The Riverside is well worth the money spent, and Shakespeare is well worth the time.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent one-stop Shakespeare source
Review: This is an excellent one-stop source for Shakespeare's collected works (including some "non-traditional" selections). The presentation is very attractive, the critical essays are well-written and informative, and the collection is more than complete.I do have two minor quibbles with this collection, however. One is that the annotations for each text appear at the bottom of the page, which is somewhat inconvenient for reading purposes. It would have been much easier to scan annotations if they were printed next to the text (perhaps a 2-column format - left column for the play, right column for the annotations). Also, the books are more useful as a reference than a "portable, read-it-anywhere" collection. They are two fairly large books, so they're not really something you could take on the bus with you.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent collection with thoughtful, insightful reviews.
Review: This is one of the best Shakespeare collections today. It contains all of the plays and sonnets, plus the poems that the Bard wrote. Each piece is introduced by a scholar who tells the history of each play, gives a synopsis of the action, and analyzes major themes as they develop through the plays. The scholars also connect Shakespeare's work to that of other writers' of his time. This is a good reference for anyone who is studying Shakespeare or who just loves to read his work.
Rating:
Summary: The most complete edition of the Bard and a superb companion
Review: This one-volume edition of Shakespeare's works is the most complete I found on the market: it includes "The Two Noble Kinsmen", Shakespeare's addition to "Sir Thomas More" (with photographical reproduction of the pages believed to be in his handwrite), the currently hot debated poem "A Funeral Elegy by W. S." and, above all, "The Reign of King Edward III", a new play recently accepted in the canon by many authoritative editors (Arden, Cambridge, Oxford). The text of each work is carefully edited and accompanied by helpful glossarial notes, a textual discussion with short bibliography, and an impressive collation which allows the reader to find variant readings and emendations. An exhaustive critical introduction precedes each play and poem, dealing with authorship, date, sources, textual differences between quarto and folio texts, and of course the principal thematic issues. What makes this a superb edition - and indeed a real "companion" to Shakespeare studies! - is the great amount of subsidiary material, including a general introduction - focusing on Shakespeare's life, art, language, style, and on the Elizabethan historical and theatrical background - and a series of useful essays on various themes: critical approaches to the plays and poems, philological issues, history of the plays on the stage, television and cinema. There are also many interesting documents, synoptic tables, glossaries, indexes, illustrated tables (both coloured and b&w) , the reproduction of the introductory pages of the First Folio of 1623, and a rich bibliography. I personally consider this book a must have for every teacher, scholar, or simply amateur of the greatest of all poets. Buy it!
Rating:
Summary: The most complete edition of the Bard and a superb companion
Review: This one-volume edition of Shakespeare's works is the most complete I found on the market: it includes "The Two Noble Kinsmen", Shakespeare's addition to "Sir Thomas More" (with photographical reproduction of the pages believed to be in his handwrite), the currently hot debated poem "A Funeral Elegy by W. S." and, above all, "The Reign of King Edward III", a new play recently accepted in the canon by many authoritative editors (Arden, Cambridge, Oxford). The text of each work is carefully edited and accompanied by helpful glossarial notes, a textual discussion with short bibliography, and an impressive collation which allows the reader to find variant readings and emendations. An exhaustive critical introduction precedes each play and poem, dealing with authorship, date, sources, textual differences between quarto and folio texts, and of course the principal thematic issues. What makes this a superb edition - and indeed a real "companion" to Shakespeare studies! - is the great amount of subsidiary material, including a general introduction - focusing on Shakespeare's life, art, language, style, and on the Elizabethan historical and theatrical background - and a series of useful essays on various themes: critical approaches to the plays and poems, philological issues, history of the plays on the stage, television and cinema. There are also many interesting documents, synoptic tables, glossaries, indexes, illustrated tables (both coloured and b&w) , the reproduction of the introductory pages of the First Folio of 1623, and a rich bibliography. I personally consider this book a must have for every teacher, scholar, or simply amateur of the greatest of all poets. Buy it!
Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Edition to Every Personal Library
Review: This text was recommended for a Shakespeare class that I undertook. I would highly recommend this for anyone studying Shakespeare or just interested in his works. The format and structure of the book in regards to the glossary and footnotes is great. In addition the introductions to each individual piece of work are extraordinary.
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