As always, Shakespeare Lives! Again! Book Review: Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler

You may think you don't need a recasting of The Taming of the Shrew in modern-day Baltimore, but I am here to tell you that you do. Kate, a.k.a. the shrew, will set you on your ear, as she does everyone she encounters. I won't give away the ending, but let's just say that the usual person does not do the taming.

As well, you need all the other bits of the fantabulous Hogarth Shakespeare Project, so clever and original and urgent in these crazy days of 2017: Jeanette Winterson’s The Gap of Time (formerly The Winter’s Tale) was published in 2015, and Howard Jacobson’s Shylock is My Name (bet you can guess its genesis) came out last February. Last October brought Margaret Atwood’s Hag-Seed, formerly known as The Tempest, where it revealed itself as a crazy prison revenge high drama; Edward St. Aubyn’s King Lear is due in 2018--who knows what marvels that might bring?

Gasp! More are coming. Just when you thought it couldn't get any better: Gillian Flynn on Hamlet, Jo Nesbø on Macbeth, and Tracy Chevalier on Othello. My heart beats faster.

Some say all the stories have been written, and many of them by Shakespeare. But this series proves that there is endless room for reinvention, and even, dare I say, betterment. You can thank me later for turning you on to this series. You are welcome!

Hogarth Shakespeare Project