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Dating Hamlet (Collins Flamingo)
by Lisa Fiedler
Product Group: Book
Publisher: CollinsFlamingo (2003-11-03)
ISBN: 0007161867
EAN: 9780007161867
Paperback: 176 pages
Edition: New Ed
SKU: B467-1096u
Condition: Like New
Comments: UNREAD but may have minor imperfections such as a crease or mark. In stock - quick dispatch, from an efficient and professional leading British bookselling firm.
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Customer Reviews
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Mary-Sue at Elsinore: someone drown her, please!
Rating  (1)
Date: 2008-11-04
I'm interested in the way that classic stories can be reworked for modern audiences, and in fanfiction as a phenomenon. However, if this appeared on a fanfiction forum, it would be pounced upon immediately as a preposterous piece of 'Mary-Sue'-dom, and the author would be suspected of being a 14-year-old with a crush on whoever is the current hot young actor playing Hamlet. As satire, it might work, but unfortunately, I suspect it is meant to be taken at face-value.
Fiedler's Ophelia is a classic Mary-Sue, with entirely anachronistic values and attitudes to gender, class & c. Even her paternity is changed in a silly plot-twist. In draining the story of any real tragedy (no sympathetic characters are allowed to remain dead, so there is no real grief or pain), this novel drains it equally of meaning. It's a Young Adult version of the wilfully anachronistic 'bodice-ripping' romance novels that, I suppose, its readers will be expected to move on to when they're old enough to handle greater sexual content. But an older/more emotionally mature teenaged reader, who feels ready to cope with more explicit love-scenes, would perhaps do better to meet the teenaged Queen Gertrude in the first part of Updike's 'Gertrude and Claudius', a spirited girl for whom the limitations of her time and social status are *real* obstacles to happiness.
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Worth a read
Rating  (4)
Date: 2006-08-28
I did enjoy this book, although that could be more to do with my dislike of Shakespeare's tragedies...it was interesting too see how the author worked around the original play, though some plotlines such as the side romance with Horatio and Anne, and Romeo (from Romeo and Juliet) attending school with Hamlet, were slightly less believable.
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An interesting twist, but the language lets it down
Rating  (3)
Date: 2004-01-08
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I have a feeling that those who have actually seen the play Hamlet will dislike this book. Lisa Fielding tries very hard to pull off a feminist review of 'Hamlet', perhaps hoping for a 'Wide Sargasso Sea'. There is an interesting twist involving the use of potions and alchemy (fans of Romeo and Juliet will recognise what's coming). The plot, however, is not the problem. Remember those exercises in English Literature where you had to write a scene in Shakespearean language? Well, this book is a bit like those exercises stretched out to novel length. I winced once or twice at some sentences or words. The sub-plot concerning Ophelia, Laertes and Polonius seemed rather pointless to me. Good intelligent people are related to annoying idiots all the time. The neat romantic ending between Laertes and Anne the scullery maid was also a little unbelievable. This is a good read, but there are some weaknesses.
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