William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

I was a little bit nervous about this book because my eight year old can be very sensitive to death and pain. I bought Midsummer nights dream by the same author and it was very nicely written so I decided to get this booked as well. It was very gentle and handled the very sensitive parts well! The illustrations were very beautiful! I definitely recommend this book

"Romeo And Juliet" by William Shakespeare adapted by Bruce Coville illustrated by Dennis Nolan (Dial Press, 1999) ---------------------------------------- This is a good, compact adaptation of Shakespeare's classic tragedy, "Romeo And Juliet," with crisp, cogent prose that includes some passages of original dialogue and an easy to follow narrative thread. Coville doesn't cut corners when it comes to the dark side of the story -- he doesn't linger on the more morbid dialogue, but makes it clear when someone is murdered or poisoned, etc. When seen in such a condensed form, the story is rather dark; the romantic allure of the two teens gets a little lost in the bustle, but this is still a fine adaptation, as are Coville's other works. (Joe Sixpack, ReadThatAgain book reviews)

My 9th grade students were having a very hard time understanding this play. After reading the first act, I went looking for something that could help them get into it. I read them this version of it, and it really helped them visualize it and really established the storyline for them. They did much better after that. I think it's a great book if you want to know the storyline or want a way to visualize the story; I don't think it replaces an actual reading of Shakespeare's play (what could?).

Author Bruce Coville is doing his part to bring Shakespeare to modern day "groundlings" by publishing beautiful picture book editions of the plays. Junior high and high school libraries would do well to include these books in their collections. This version of Romeo and Juliet has lovely and romantic illustrations by Dennis Nolan. My favorite is the balconey scene which folds out vertically and shows Juliet at the top of the page and Romeo is looking up at her from the bottom. The vertical height is emphasized by the vertical fold-up.

My 5th grade students reading the original R & J love this version for the simplicity of the language, to help them understand difficult parts of the original text, and for the phenomenal illustrations. The girls are especially interested, and wait for a turn to read the book. My own 4 and 5 year old children love the book, and ask to have it read to them every night at bedtime. They don't seem at all bothered by the death scene at the end, which did worry me at the first reading. I also highly recommend the same team's version of Midsummer Night's Dream for the same reasons, both 5th graders and preschoolers love them.