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Lunatics, Lovers and Poets: Twelve Stories after Cervantes and Shakespeare
"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
are of imagination all compact."
- William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
To commemorate the 400th anniversary of the deaths of William Shakespeare and Miguel de Cervantes, And Other Stories and Hay Festival have selected twelve contemporary international authors to each write an original and previously unpublished story as their tribute to these giants of world literature.
In order to celebrate the international influence of both writers and offer us new and intriguing perspectives on them, six English-speaking authors have taken inspiration from Cervantes and his work, while six Spanish-language authors have written stories inspired by Shakespeare.
The authors are Ben Okri, Deborah Levy, Kamila Shamsie, Yuri Herrera, Marcos Giralt Torrente, Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Vicente Molina Foix, Soledad Puértolas, Hisham Matar, Nell Leyshon, Rhidian Brook and Valeria Luiselli. An introduction by Salman Rushdie explores the liberating legacy of Cervantes and Shakespeare for contemporary fiction.
are of imagination all compact."
- William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
To commemorate the 400th anniversary of the deaths of William Shakespeare and Miguel de Cervantes, And Other Stories and Hay Festival have selected twelve contemporary international authors to each write an original and previously unpublished story as their tribute to these giants of world literature.
In order to celebrate the international influence of both writers and offer us new and intriguing perspectives on them, six English-speaking authors have taken inspiration from Cervantes and his work, while six Spanish-language authors have written stories inspired by Shakespeare.
The authors are Ben Okri, Deborah Levy, Kamila Shamsie, Yuri Herrera, Marcos Giralt Torrente, Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Vicente Molina Foix, Soledad Puértolas, Hisham Matar, Nell Leyshon, Rhidian Brook and Valeria Luiselli. An introduction by Salman Rushdie explores the liberating legacy of Cervantes and Shakespeare for contemporary fiction.
240 pages, Paperback
First published April 12, 2016
11 people are currently reading
341 people want to read
About the author
Daniel Hahn
121books34followersBritish writer, editor and translator; author of a number of works of non-fiction, including biographies, history, and reading guides and for children and teenagers.
His translation of The Book of Chameleons by José Eduardo Agualusa won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2007. He is also the translator of Pelé's autobiography, and of work by novelists José Luís Peixoto, Philippe Claudel, María Dueñas, José Saramago, Eduardo Halfon, Gonçalo M. Tavares and others.
A former chair of the Translators Association and national programme director of the British Centre for Literary Translation, he is currently chair of the Society of Authors and on the board of trustees of a number of organisations working with literature, literacy and free expression, including English PEN. He is one of the judges for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize.
adapted from .
His translation of The Book of Chameleons by José Eduardo Agualusa won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2007. He is also the translator of Pelé's autobiography, and of work by novelists José Luís Peixoto, Philippe Claudel, María Dueñas, José Saramago, Eduardo Halfon, Gonçalo M. Tavares and others.
A former chair of the Translators Association and national programme director of the British Centre for Literary Translation, he is currently chair of the Society of Authors and on the board of trustees of a number of organisations working with literature, literacy and free expression, including English PEN. He is one of the judges for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize.
adapted from .
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
March 23, 2020
Read ten of the twelve. None of the stories attempt to capture the comic exuberance or picaresque spirit of Cervantes, nor the linguistic ambition or blood-curdling drama of Shakespeare. Instead these are first-person stories written in plain and unexciting prose, with tenuous links to the homaged author of choice. Some (Nell Leyshon) indulge in awful staccato sentences in a cringing faux-poetic register (one of the viruses of modern writing), some read like stories crowbarred in for the star-author cred (Deborah Levy), some make irrelevant topical references (Soledad Puértolas), and most are lacking in humour (a crucial trait of the two titans), with Rhidian Brook’s flat meta-doodle the one comic contribution. The mix of Spanish and British voices is interesting, however, each writer has their own particular thematic or stylistic preoccupations they seem reluctant to depart from, and few of them seem energised by the challenge.
March 31, 2020
4.5
After reading all three of ’s novels this year, I searched for more of his writing and discovered he had a short story in this collection, all published by the not-for-private-profit press . While Herrera’s story, which takes as its inspiration Shakespeare’s was not my favorite of these, the comparison worked for his tale of Mexican corruption.
All I’d previously read of Cervantes was , but I sought out his short story “The Glass Graduate" (online) after reading ’s “Glass�. Later on in the collection is ’s “The Glass Woman�, also a take-off on the Cervantes story. Though set in different times and locales, both 'glass' stories in this collection speak to a young woman’s trepidation over love and the physical body.
The opening story, "Don Quixote and the Ambiguity of Reading" by , is a clever, pointed update to the tale of Don Quixote and the printing press, Okri’s story being set in Nigeria and his Quixote armed with a machete. Also in a metafictional vein is ’s “The Anthology Massacre�: as did Okri, Brook uses his own name in his story, as well as poking fun at literary competitiveness and even this anthology.
I seem to have remembered the Cervantes-inspired stories (the task of the English-language writers) more than the Shakespearean ones (the task of the Spanish-language writers); though � set-in-Columbia “The Dogs of War�, inspired by , is memorable in its poignancy for what’s left unsaid.
I will be looking out for even more And Other Stories books.
After reading all three of ’s novels this year, I searched for more of his writing and discovered he had a short story in this collection, all published by the not-for-private-profit press . While Herrera’s story, which takes as its inspiration Shakespeare’s was not my favorite of these, the comparison worked for his tale of Mexican corruption.
All I’d previously read of Cervantes was , but I sought out his short story “The Glass Graduate" (online) after reading ’s “Glass�. Later on in the collection is ’s “The Glass Woman�, also a take-off on the Cervantes story. Though set in different times and locales, both 'glass' stories in this collection speak to a young woman’s trepidation over love and the physical body.
The opening story, "Don Quixote and the Ambiguity of Reading" by , is a clever, pointed update to the tale of Don Quixote and the printing press, Okri’s story being set in Nigeria and his Quixote armed with a machete. Also in a metafictional vein is ’s “The Anthology Massacre�: as did Okri, Brook uses his own name in his story, as well as poking fun at literary competitiveness and even this anthology.
I seem to have remembered the Cervantes-inspired stories (the task of the English-language writers) more than the Shakespearean ones (the task of the Spanish-language writers); though � set-in-Columbia “The Dogs of War�, inspired by , is memorable in its poignancy for what’s left unsaid.
I will be looking out for even more And Other Stories books.
July 2, 2016
A Cross-Cultural Celebration
William Shakespeare and Miguel de Cervantes died on the same date, 23 April 1616. The Hay Festival had the brilliant idea of celebrating the joint quatercentenary with a collection of stories inspired by the two authors. And for full cross-cultural effect, the Cervantes-inspired stories would all be written by English-speaking writers, while the Shakespeare pieces would be written in Spanish and presented here in translation. Actually, the cross-culturalism goes further: of the writers in English, Hisham Matar is originally Libyan, Ben Okri Nigerian, and Kamila Shamsie Pakistani; Rhidian Brook introduces himself in his own piece as the token Welshman; the two Englishmen—no, women—are Deborah Levy and Nell Leyshon. The Spanish-speaking sextet include three writers from Spain itself (Marcos Giralt Torrente, Vicente Molina Foix, and Soledad Puértolas), two Mexicans (Yuri Herrera and Valeria Luiselli), and one Colombian (Juan Gabriel Vásquez), again four men and two women. A general introduction by Salman Rushdie gves the cross-cultural stew an extra stir.
I approach them on uneven footing, however, for while I have taught Shakespeare for years, I know Cervantes only from reading a much shortened Don Quixote prepared for intermediate readers of Spanish. Nonetheless, I think I enjoyed the Cervantes stories the best as a group. Perhaps partly because because there was no translator to get in the way, partly because on the whole the writers were channeling the author's spirit rather than specific narratives, and partly because some of them were just so darned good. Ben Okri opens with "Don Quixote and the Ambiguity of Reading," a Nigerian-set story inspired as much by Borges as Cervantes, and the most intellectually profound story in the set. "The Piano Bar" by Hisham Matar has the air of a noir political thriller set in a smoky Cairo bar some years after the deposition of King Farouk. And Nell Leyshon in "Glass" and Deborah Levy in "The Glass Woman" both offer feminine variants on Cervantes' story El licenciado Vidreria that, though quite different, both manage to be rather tender and very moving.
Perhaps it is not surprising that, of the Shakespearean pieces, I liked "The Dogs of War" by Juan Gabriel Vásquez best, because I already had such respect for the author. In the brilliant manner for which he is known, he counterpoints Julius Caesar with the real assassination of a Colombian reformer at the hands of Pablo Escobar, then heartbreakingly relates it to the mere mention of a personal tragedy of his own. This was a six-star story for me; the others ranged from three to five, and tended to be more restricted in scope, though Yuri Herrera in "Coriolanus" manages to recreate Shakespeare's story in the pitch-perfect language of contemporary politics, and Vicente Molina Foix went the other way in "Egyptian Puppet" setting a rather oblique backstage story in the London of Shakespeare's own time.
I never know how to rate story collections. There are two or three things here that I shall remember for a long time, but also two or three that made little impression. But all of them were at the very least solid, and the collection as a whole is both unified in its vigorous celebration of differences, and most enjoyable.
William Shakespeare and Miguel de Cervantes died on the same date, 23 April 1616. The Hay Festival had the brilliant idea of celebrating the joint quatercentenary with a collection of stories inspired by the two authors. And for full cross-cultural effect, the Cervantes-inspired stories would all be written by English-speaking writers, while the Shakespeare pieces would be written in Spanish and presented here in translation. Actually, the cross-culturalism goes further: of the writers in English, Hisham Matar is originally Libyan, Ben Okri Nigerian, and Kamila Shamsie Pakistani; Rhidian Brook introduces himself in his own piece as the token Welshman; the two Englishmen—no, women—are Deborah Levy and Nell Leyshon. The Spanish-speaking sextet include three writers from Spain itself (Marcos Giralt Torrente, Vicente Molina Foix, and Soledad Puértolas), two Mexicans (Yuri Herrera and Valeria Luiselli), and one Colombian (Juan Gabriel Vásquez), again four men and two women. A general introduction by Salman Rushdie gves the cross-cultural stew an extra stir.
I approach them on uneven footing, however, for while I have taught Shakespeare for years, I know Cervantes only from reading a much shortened Don Quixote prepared for intermediate readers of Spanish. Nonetheless, I think I enjoyed the Cervantes stories the best as a group. Perhaps partly because because there was no translator to get in the way, partly because on the whole the writers were channeling the author's spirit rather than specific narratives, and partly because some of them were just so darned good. Ben Okri opens with "Don Quixote and the Ambiguity of Reading," a Nigerian-set story inspired as much by Borges as Cervantes, and the most intellectually profound story in the set. "The Piano Bar" by Hisham Matar has the air of a noir political thriller set in a smoky Cairo bar some years after the deposition of King Farouk. And Nell Leyshon in "Glass" and Deborah Levy in "The Glass Woman" both offer feminine variants on Cervantes' story El licenciado Vidreria that, though quite different, both manage to be rather tender and very moving.
Perhaps it is not surprising that, of the Shakespearean pieces, I liked "The Dogs of War" by Juan Gabriel Vásquez best, because I already had such respect for the author. In the brilliant manner for which he is known, he counterpoints Julius Caesar with the real assassination of a Colombian reformer at the hands of Pablo Escobar, then heartbreakingly relates it to the mere mention of a personal tragedy of his own. This was a six-star story for me; the others ranged from three to five, and tended to be more restricted in scope, though Yuri Herrera in "Coriolanus" manages to recreate Shakespeare's story in the pitch-perfect language of contemporary politics, and Vicente Molina Foix went the other way in "Egyptian Puppet" setting a rather oblique backstage story in the London of Shakespeare's own time.
I never know how to rate story collections. There are two or three things here that I shall remember for a long time, but also two or three that made little impression. But all of them were at the very least solid, and the collection as a whole is both unified in its vigorous celebration of differences, and most enjoyable.
March 31, 2018
That Shakespeare and Cervantes died on the same day is a nice yarn; as Salman Rushdie points out in his introduction to this story collection, reality can only manage the same year. Still, it was a clever idea in 2016 to mark the four hundredth anniversary by having six well-known Spanish-speaking writers do a Shakespearean fictional turn, and six of their Anglophone counterparts do the same genuflection for Cervantes.
The results are hugely varied - and mixed in the other sense too. The air of an exercise always seems to hang like a cheap shawl around the shoulders of these enterprises, and few of the stories really sing. But there’s a lot of talent on display. Ben Okri is a worker in a print shop where Cervantes himself shows up and lectures him on how to read. Yuri Herrera convincingly places Coriolanus in the office thuggery of Mamet-land - but what he does with the conceit is strangely inconclusive, like a good scene chopped from a longer piece. Interestingly, Hisham Matar’s The Piano Bar mines from Cervantes a rather similar lesson of numinous, unresolved threat in another lovingly-crafted realist setting - a shady Ciro business meeting.
To me, it felt like a relief from duty to move to more surreal territory with Nell Leyshon’s short, enigmatic, but beautiful Glass, in which a young woman takes to her bed as she becomes transparent. But my own favorite - oh, perhaps I am shallow! - is Rhidian Brook’s dark farce The Anthology Massacre. His narrator is the soon-to-be-world-famous scribe of a new Quixote, written from the viewpoint of the horse. Awaiting the inevitable breathless call from the publisher, this genius in waiting has his path to fame miraculously shortened when a bomb at a book launch wipes out all his rivals. A very nice addition to the population of deluded narrators.
The results are hugely varied - and mixed in the other sense too. The air of an exercise always seems to hang like a cheap shawl around the shoulders of these enterprises, and few of the stories really sing. But there’s a lot of talent on display. Ben Okri is a worker in a print shop where Cervantes himself shows up and lectures him on how to read. Yuri Herrera convincingly places Coriolanus in the office thuggery of Mamet-land - but what he does with the conceit is strangely inconclusive, like a good scene chopped from a longer piece. Interestingly, Hisham Matar’s The Piano Bar mines from Cervantes a rather similar lesson of numinous, unresolved threat in another lovingly-crafted realist setting - a shady Ciro business meeting.
To me, it felt like a relief from duty to move to more surreal territory with Nell Leyshon’s short, enigmatic, but beautiful Glass, in which a young woman takes to her bed as she becomes transparent. But my own favorite - oh, perhaps I am shallow! - is Rhidian Brook’s dark farce The Anthology Massacre. His narrator is the soon-to-be-world-famous scribe of a new Quixote, written from the viewpoint of the horse. Awaiting the inevitable breathless call from the publisher, this genius in waiting has his path to fame miraculously shortened when a bomb at a book launch wipes out all his rivals. A very nice addition to the population of deluded narrators.
March 7, 2016
My knowledge of Cervantes outside of Don Quixote is non-existant, and my Shakespeare is patchy at best. What brought me to this wasn't the subject matter, but rather signing up to & Other Stories' excellent subscription service. So I embarked on it with no preconceptions beyond the publishers' track record. But the fact is knowledge of Cervantes and Shakespeare, whilst undoubtedly an advantage, isn't necessary to enjoy what is simply a great collection of short stories. Varied in style, but consistent in quality, thoroughly enjoyable.
June 6, 2017
Three excellent pieces - Ben Okri's opener, 'Don Quixote and the Ambiguity of Reading', 'Glass' by Nell Leyshon and 'Shakespeare, New Mexico' by Valeria Luiselli - but the rest didn't do so much for me. In terms of the exercise, interesting to see that the stories based on Cervantes seemed better suited to re-invention than Shakepseare's, despite so many of Shakespeare's stories being reinventions themselves.
October 5, 2016
I liked nine of the twelve stories here, three quite a lot:
"The Dogs of War" (Juan Gabriel Vazquez, translated by Anne Mc Lean)
"Mir Aslam of Kolachi" (Kamila Shamsie)
"The Anthology Massacre" (Rhidian Brook)
The deeper your knowledge of Shakespeare's and Cervantes' works, the more you will appreciate what these authors have attempted.
"The Dogs of War" (Juan Gabriel Vazquez, translated by Anne Mc Lean)
"Mir Aslam of Kolachi" (Kamila Shamsie)
"The Anthology Massacre" (Rhidian Brook)
The deeper your knowledge of Shakespeare's and Cervantes' works, the more you will appreciate what these authors have attempted.
April 13, 2016
an entertaining, brilliantly conceived, if not somewhat uneven collection of commissioned short stories marking the quadricentennial of both shakespeare and cervantes's deaths in 1616, lunatics, lovers and poets is a collaboration between uk publisher and other stories and the hay festival. featuring six english-language authors with an original piece inspired by cervantes and six spanish-language authors with an original piece (in translation) inspired by shakespeare, lunatics, lovers and poets is one of the most imaginatively, thematically linked collections to come along in some time.
the twelve stories in this anthology range in style and subject, yet are each decent enough to stand on their own. the collection's highlights are ben okri's metafictional "don quixote and the ambiguity of reading," juan gabriel vásquez's caesarean "the dogs of war," marcos giralt torrente's suburban hamlet "opening windows," and valeria luiselli's ribald macbethian "shakespeare, new mexico." a well-executed and clever idea, lunatics, lovers and poets is a nod to the centuries-spanning legacy of history's two most influential writers.
*edited by daniel hahn and margarita valencia. introduced by sir salman rushdie. stories by ben okri, kamila shamsie, juan gabriel vásquez (translated by anne mclean), yuri herrera (translated by lisa dillman), nell leyshon, marcos giralt torrente (translated by samantha schnee), hisham matar, soledad puértolas (translated by rosalind harvey), vicente molina foix (translated by frank wynne), deborah levy, rhidian brook, and valeria luiselli (translated by christina mcsweeney).
the twelve stories in this anthology range in style and subject, yet are each decent enough to stand on their own. the collection's highlights are ben okri's metafictional "don quixote and the ambiguity of reading," juan gabriel vásquez's caesarean "the dogs of war," marcos giralt torrente's suburban hamlet "opening windows," and valeria luiselli's ribald macbethian "shakespeare, new mexico." a well-executed and clever idea, lunatics, lovers and poets is a nod to the centuries-spanning legacy of history's two most influential writers.
let it be said, while i have breath, that he made us more imaginative, just by being himself. i had never felt myself more locked in the box of my possibilities than in the presence of that man. he was a call to greatness. we failed to take up that challenge, cowards that most of us are. that failure is the lingering regret of my life. for a life passes, a life is lived. it is lived under fear and caution. one thinks of one's family. one thinks of one's self. but the life passes. and it is only the fires that your life lit in other people's souls that count. this i know now in the long, uneventful autumn of my life. there are some people one should never have met, because they introduce into your heart an eternal regret for the greater life you did not live.
(from ben okri's "don quixote and the ambiguity of reading")
*edited by daniel hahn and margarita valencia. introduced by sir salman rushdie. stories by ben okri, kamila shamsie, juan gabriel vásquez (translated by anne mclean), yuri herrera (translated by lisa dillman), nell leyshon, marcos giralt torrente (translated by samantha schnee), hisham matar, soledad puértolas (translated by rosalind harvey), vicente molina foix (translated by frank wynne), deborah levy, rhidian brook, and valeria luiselli (translated by christina mcsweeney).
May 23, 2016
A great concept that is (unsurprisingly) imperfectly executed. Lunatics, Lovers and Poets puts together twelve newly commissioned stories for the four hundredth anniversary of the deaths of Shakespeare and Cervantes, with six Spanish language writers in translation on Shakespeare and six English language writers on Cervantes (there is evidently a parallel version published in Spain with the reverse translations). The writers are drawn from all over the world and are a wide range of ages and perspectives. The stories too, are widely, varied with some particularly memorable and excellent ones. A few of my favorites (in rough order):
Ben Okri depicts a Don Quixote transported to a different time/place coming into a printing press that is printing the book Don Quixote.
Rhidian Brook's "The Anthology Massacre" told in the first person about a person whose book "Rocinante's Revenge," which retells Don Quixote from the horses perspective and at greater length, is rejected by multiple publishers. At first he seems to learn about a massacre of many of the leading writers/editors but as the unreliable narration continues you learn he himself committed the crime.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez on the assassination of Colombia's Justice Minister in reminiscence by a teacher of Shakespeare focused on Julius Caesar.
Valeria Luiselli's story about a Mexican family of historical reenactors that travels to Shakespeare, New Mexico, for a particularly grueling gig that goes badly wrong.
Two versions of Cervantes The Glass Graduate, one by Nell Leyshon and one by Deborah Levy.
And some other stories are pretty good as well.
Ben Okri depicts a Don Quixote transported to a different time/place coming into a printing press that is printing the book Don Quixote.
Rhidian Brook's "The Anthology Massacre" told in the first person about a person whose book "Rocinante's Revenge," which retells Don Quixote from the horses perspective and at greater length, is rejected by multiple publishers. At first he seems to learn about a massacre of many of the leading writers/editors but as the unreliable narration continues you learn he himself committed the crime.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez on the assassination of Colombia's Justice Minister in reminiscence by a teacher of Shakespeare focused on Julius Caesar.
Valeria Luiselli's story about a Mexican family of historical reenactors that travels to Shakespeare, New Mexico, for a particularly grueling gig that goes badly wrong.
Two versions of Cervantes The Glass Graduate, one by Nell Leyshon and one by Deborah Levy.
And some other stories are pretty good as well.
October 8, 2016
This collection of short stories was produced to honour the 400th anniversary of the deaths of Shakespeare and Cervantes (who died on the same day, not just the same year). There are 12 stories, half written originally in Spanish, half in English, and two editions have been produced, one in English and one in Spanish. It’s a mixed bunch, but they’re all good, to varying degrees. The references to Shakespeare and Cervantes vary in how subtle or obvious they are, and how literal.
“Opening windows� by Marcos Giralt Torrente (translated by Samantha Schnee) is about teenagers putting on a play that is painfully close to the truth for the lead actor’s family, and has clear echoes of Hamlet. “Shakespeare, New Mexico� by Valeria Luiselli (translated by Christina MacSweeney) is about a family of re-enactors who move to a ghost town to act the part of Wild West characters, repeating the same tired old scenes over and over.
My favourite of the bunch is actually the first, “Don Quixote and the ambiguity of reading� by Ben Okri. Its story is simple, if very meta: Don Quixote and Sancho visit a printing press in modern Nigeria where their story is being printed. It is a treatise on reading, fame and what we are remembered for, and there is a perfect quote on every page. Not only that, but despite its uneventful story based on a book I’ve never read, it took me on real emotional journey of laughter and tears and heartache. It made me question my very perspective on life and memory. That’s pretty impressive in 20 pages. I clearly need to read more Okri.
“Opening windows� by Marcos Giralt Torrente (translated by Samantha Schnee) is about teenagers putting on a play that is painfully close to the truth for the lead actor’s family, and has clear echoes of Hamlet. “Shakespeare, New Mexico� by Valeria Luiselli (translated by Christina MacSweeney) is about a family of re-enactors who move to a ghost town to act the part of Wild West characters, repeating the same tired old scenes over and over.
My favourite of the bunch is actually the first, “Don Quixote and the ambiguity of reading� by Ben Okri. Its story is simple, if very meta: Don Quixote and Sancho visit a printing press in modern Nigeria where their story is being printed. It is a treatise on reading, fame and what we are remembered for, and there is a perfect quote on every page. Not only that, but despite its uneventful story based on a book I’ve never read, it took me on real emotional journey of laughter and tears and heartache. It made me question my very perspective on life and memory. That’s pretty impressive in 20 pages. I clearly need to read more Okri.
May 15, 2016
I really enjoyed this collection of stories inspired by Cervantes and Shakespeare.
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March 16, 2019
I'm going to start by saying that quite a few of these stories fell pretty flat for me. The first one was not the most interesting either, and I found myself skipping through paragraphs.
However, I don't want to mark it down because a lot of the stories were also brilliant, and besides, this is the most post-colonial Shakespeare I've read in... well, ever. I don't know about Cervantes, but in the Shakespeare field we like to say we're open and doing New Things and being Inclusive, but all the same when I read the concept of this book, six Shakespeare stories written in Spanish and six Cervantes stories written in English, I was expecting US and American white men's writing, and Spain-spanish writers too.
What I got instead was quite a few very interesting stories about Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, and Nigeria. Really touching stories, too, at times. So, overall, it's well worth the read.
However, I don't want to mark it down because a lot of the stories were also brilliant, and besides, this is the most post-colonial Shakespeare I've read in... well, ever. I don't know about Cervantes, but in the Shakespeare field we like to say we're open and doing New Things and being Inclusive, but all the same when I read the concept of this book, six Shakespeare stories written in Spanish and six Cervantes stories written in English, I was expecting US and American white men's writing, and Spain-spanish writers too.
What I got instead was quite a few very interesting stories about Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, and Nigeria. Really touching stories, too, at times. So, overall, it's well worth the read.
March 7, 2021
As might be expected with an anthology of stories specially written by twelve different writers, I liked some of these stories more than others. Some, indeed, rather dragged (the Okri went on far too long, for example, before not really getting anywhere much). The connections to Shakespeare and Cervantes were sometimes not completely obvious.
There are some absolute delights in here, though. The Vasquez was not the sort of thing I was expecting at all, but it is great, really interesting. Also containing more non-fiction than I expected, and also great, is Levy’s contribution. I loved the stories by Matar, Brook and Luiselli, and liked those by Torrente, Shamsie, Foix, Leyshon, and Puertolas.
I’m not sure I gained any insight into Cervantes� or Shakespeare’s work, but I was introduced to some new, interesting writers.
There are some absolute delights in here, though. The Vasquez was not the sort of thing I was expecting at all, but it is great, really interesting. Also containing more non-fiction than I expected, and also great, is Levy’s contribution. I loved the stories by Matar, Brook and Luiselli, and liked those by Torrente, Shamsie, Foix, Leyshon, and Puertolas.
I’m not sure I gained any insight into Cervantes� or Shakespeare’s work, but I was introduced to some new, interesting writers.
August 24, 2022
such a great collection of writers, but unfortunately the stories are extraordinarily below average. none of them engaged me, Okri and Matar’s stories were the only bearable ones, and even these were average. Valeria Luiselli’s story was very well written but it shocked my core for how graphic it got slowly. Shamsie’s didn’t engage me, nor did Rushdie’s introduction.
April 18, 2023
⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
A wonderful short story collection with an interesting premise. I enjoyed the stories written by the Spanish-language authors the most but that’s to be expected as they’re Shakespeare inspired!
A wonderful short story collection with an interesting premise. I enjoyed the stories written by the Spanish-language authors the most but that’s to be expected as they’re Shakespeare inspired!
September 10, 2019
An interesting premise for a collection of short stories. My favorites were the first and last, by Ben Okri and Valeria Luiselli (of course).
August 19, 2020
Something of a curate's egg. All the stories are inventive but not all of them work.
February 13, 2021
I would recommend this!
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