Reviews for William Shakespeare

The average rating for William Shakespeare based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-09-15 00:00:00 Renn Newwer Diane Stanley, whose many picture-book biographies include Good Queen Bess: The Story of Elizabeth I of England and Saladin: Noble Prince of Islam , here turns her attention to one of the most famous composers of all time, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Framed as a three-act puppet play, Mozart: The Wonder Child opens when its subject, Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgang Gottlieb Mozart, is three years old, and just discovering the world of music, and follows him through his youth as a "Wunderkind," or child prodigy, touring Europe with his family, to the time when he strikes out on his own, and starts his own family. This is an informative book, which will give young readers an excellent introduction to Mozart's life and work. It doesn't completely gloss over the unpleasant aspects of the story, like Mozart's estrangement from his father and sister, Nannerl, or his early death, which I appreciated. The artwork, done in egg tempera on gessoed wooden panels, is simply gorgeous, although I think I agree with another reviewer, in finding the puppeteering aspect more of a distraction than anything else. This is a very text-heavy picture-book, so I'd recommend it to more advanced early readers (if that makes sense), particularly if they are interested in music, or enjoy biography.

Review # 2 was written on 2019-04-02 00:00:00 Aaron Urquidez I actually want to give this 4 stars for the information in the text, but 3 for the illustrations. I appreciate the concept of the puppet play, but the strings were just annoying. What I really liked about this book was what I learned about Mozart that I'd never known before. For example, I didn't know the details of the relationship between Mozart and his father. I thought they were always on good terms, but apparently not. In fact, I also thought that Mozart and his sister Nannerl were always on good terms, but not so. I also didn't know that he taught music. He seems to have been quite the character. I thought the movie "Amadeus" was exaggerating his eccentricity! I found it interesting that, once he was living on his own in Vienna, he had to compose a new concerto for every performance he gave, even at parties, because people didn't like to hear the same thing twice. No wonder he wrote so much! I also didn't know that he and Constanze had 6 children, only 2 of whom lived. It's too bad that he died so young--think of all the more music he'd have left us had he lived longer. Recommended.