Shakespeare's Sonnets (Highbridge Classics)

We purchased this audiobook with our children in mind, hoping it might serve as an introduction to Shakespearean language while freeing us up to pursue our own interests during car trips. Disappointingly, Mr. Callow's affected speech proves very difficult to follow, even after repeated hearings. He speaks far too quickly and musically, which distracts from the sonnets themselves.

Additionally, the sonnets are not each clearly delineated from the other. Strained ears find the occasional familiar line, but such effort is ultimately better spent reading the sonnets aloud ourselves. Spend your money elsewhere, if you wish to keep the babies entertained.

This guy read the Auden in Four Weddings and Funeral I think. Simon Callow treats his voice as an instrument. He can strum and roar and hiss and bellow. And he has taken some trouble with the notes and tones. This may seem a rather contrived sensibility at first, but he uses his velvet oboe of his voice to a fine effect, calling it to the issue of the meaning prehaps more than a concern for a natural tone. And I quickly got over this modern quibble. The sonnets are contrivances and they are also concerned with terrible truths. Callow has invented a style that fits. And to his credit, it is also startlingly passionate.

Tongue tied when it comes to telling someone how much you care? Send this audio book to that special person. You'll not only be thought romantic but erudite as well.

After all, even at your best you probably couldn't come up with
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date."

These love poems have been extolled for over 400 years, quoted, misquoted, and copied. Written between 1593 - 1601, to a great degree the 154 sonnets reveal the Bard's thoughts on the perplexities of life - love, honor, rebirth. Perhaps most important to many we also find his attraction to the "Dark Lady." Is there a reference in Sonnet 151 with "Love is too young to know what conscience is...."?

All the world loves a mystery which may be why we're so fascinated by the Dark Lady. Her identity is unknown, it is not even known whether she was a real woman with whom Shakespeare had a relationship or a manifestation of his creativity. Some surmise that she was so called because her hair was black and her skin dusk colored, thus she was Spanish. Others posit that "dark" did not refer to her appearance but rather to the black or dark feelings of desire. This discussion may go on indefinitely.

Unfortunately, British actor Simon Callow's brilliant reading of the sonnets only lasts two hours. However, the replay button is at the ready. "Shakespeare's Sonnets" is a keeper to be enjoyed over and over again.

- Gail Cooke