What Would Shakespeare Make Of All These Novelists Reimagining His Plays?

Adam Gopnik, reviewing several titles in the Hogarth Shakespeare Project: “We are supposed to say that he would be pleased, but in truth he would be puzzled. … The low-key, chastened, anti-dramatic movement of Anne Tyler’s imagination – no marvels or events, really, just inner action rebounding off half-spoken idea – would have baffled him. This sells? He was used to getting half of London on their asses for a play, and he knew you needed bloody scenes and children baked in pies to do it.”