Shakespeare Right Now!

Tired of scholars’ tedious tomes?

Sick of spoilers and footnote whiplash?

Read new, free versions of Macbeth,
Julius Caesar, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night,
The Taming of the Shrew, Much Ado  About Nothing, Antony and Cleopatra,
As You Like It, Othello, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, King Lear,
The Tempest, King Richard II, Cymbeline,  The Comedy of Errors, Titus Andronicus, Timon of Athens, Pericles, Coriolanus,  Henry V, Henry VI, Parts 1, 2, and 3,
King Richard III, Love's Labours Lost,
The Merry Wives of Windsor,
The Winter's Tale, King John, Measure for Measure, Henry VIII, Troilus and Cressida,  All's Well That Ends Well, King Henry IV, Part 1, King Henry IV, Part 2 and The Two Gentlemen of Verona that make clear who’s speaking to whom, where they are, and what’s happening!

Now Added!

Visitor Survey

All 37 are here now!

Performing Shakespeare properly calls for a full understanding of the script: the director and actors should share perceptions of the characters’ personalities, motivations and actions, and of what they say means.

But all too often theater folks’ reliance on differing texts -- assembled by academic scholars focused on literary and Elizabethan-Jacobean history, not on living performance today -- results in a production with passages that are disjointed or puzzling, if not just plain opaque to the audience.

Shakespeare Right Now! offers -- for free -- help with getting everyone on the same page: the full Globe-edition dialog of each play, presented within a clear narrative like a novel’s, with no footnotes.

All of the standard canon’s 37 titles are now available here, free for personal use; they can be downloaded: as document files -- Microsoft Word (.doc), portable document (.pdf), and rich-text (.rtf); in Web browsers’ hypertext markup language (.html); and in e-book formats EPUB, MOBI, LRF and PDB.

The files use no DRM (digital rights management) copy-protection scheme, and no registration is required here to download them, or to read them on line.

Having your cast and crew all begin from the same clear, basic story conception will make for greater accord among a company’s finished scenes, and consistency in the staged whole, even if, for a particular show, the director decides to change some things.

Note: iTunes supports the PDF and EPUB formats; drag a file in either to your iTunes library, and it will be filed under Books.

What’s New?

The Visitor Survey!

Three brief essays have been added to the Chalk Board section.

For those weary of reading cereal-box ingredients listings,  37 Novels and About Me discuss yours truly, and how I got this way.

The other piece is a short rant on the treatment Shakespeare received from an envious, would-be competitor.

Macbeth
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

At the end of a violent insurrection, three mischievous agents of Fate tempt a valiant Scottish warrior -- who in peacetime is an unprincipled nobleman reluctant to create, criminally, political opportunity.
His ambitious wife demands that he act, and the pair's conniving bears its fruits -- and consequences. Living in luxury, the perpetrators are haunted: she, tormented by nightmarish guilt, he, sleepless, driven to violent action in hopes of altering his dismal prophesied destiny.
Macbeth's extravagance and increasingly malevolent deeds spur resistance, bringing Scottish nobility to the brink of civil war.
Always bold, he is fearless after again consulting the "witches." As have many others, after seizing power he comes to believe he's invincible.
Only the impossible could defeat him -- but his patriotic opponents must try.

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Julius Caesar
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

A quintessential leader enlivens the story: Julius Caesar -- general, statesman and magnanimous sovereign; brilliant, effective, and canny. In 55 B.C. he had led the first Roman invasion of Britain; now, ten years later, he returns from his latest campaign, defeating a rebellion in Spain.
Another admired Roman, Marcus Brutus, chief praetor (judge), who hopes to succeed him, is also charismatic, and considers himself a patriot. He reveres his namesake forebear, one of the capital's founders, and resists the strong urgings of his own ambition.
But a wily senator and former general, Caius Cassius, has been conspiring, with other elite politicians who resent Caesar's popular reforms, to assassinate the ruler. And as the full Senate prepares to crown Julius, already named dictator for life, and make him emperor, Cassius moves to enlist Brutus to endorse the plotters' disingenuous arguments and bolster their cause.
The fickle populace is manipulated by both sides in the aftermath of Caesar's murder, and four armies clash in bloody combat when two of the killers and their troops are pursued by forces of the men now ruling Rome -- Mark Antony and Octavius Caesar.
Long-suffering wives, valiant warriors, a soothsayer, a poet and a camp-follower -- even a ghost -- all have their moments, as the interests of conservatives and liberals, ambitious plutocrats and self-serving commoners all collide.

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The Merchant of Venice
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

This lively tale examines risk-taking and investment -- and reveals how gains can be realized through commitment.
In order to thrive by surcharging for goods bought and sold, stored and shipped, the Italian city-state's aristocrats often borrow cash -- yet some decry, on principle, moneylenders' profiting from the use of gold itself. In a superb irony, one usurer's situation is improved after an overly comfortable ideologue first experiences the down side of hazarding in business.
A worthy young heiress is compelled to wait while privileged outsiders gamble with her fate. A nobleman whose reckless expeditions have sunk his own fortune now trades on a friend's affection -- jeopardizing the older lord's riches as well. Blithe young gentlemen emulate a successful entrepreneur, while a poor man's son looks for prosperity in high-spirited service.
All of them hope to develop good returns under the precepts that are supposed to govern the conduct of such ventures. But how well do the common rules of commerce and cooperation work? How are they enforced?
And when can -- should -- conscience overrule contractual or filial obligation?
Settlements are reached between young and old, rich and poor, male and female, insider and outsider, in Shakespeare's rich Renaissance tapestry.

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Romeo and Juliet
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Renaissance Italy, sunny, fertile and flourishing, is the setting for vibrant romance. Two teenagers meet one evening at a party and instantly are mutually entranced. Soon they are married by their priest.
But both have lived under the sway of arrogant, privileged men. Two leading houses are troubling Verona with competitive belligerence: Lord Capulet is Juliet's father, Lord Montague is Romeo's. Their prince has demanded peace between the factions, and the old noblemen would be content with that; but the town's swaggering, pugnacious youths, gentlemen and serving-men alike, persist in pointless strife.
When the rift suddenly escalates, Romeo is caught up in the turmoil. Friar Laurence proposes a scheme to free him, and the newlyweds enjoy one night together before the young husband must flee the city.
The temporally focused priest puts faith in the powerful grace of Nature's true qualities. He believes earth's living things all offer some special good. But he's aware that nothing is so good but that, improperly used, it "revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse. Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied."
Still, the monk thinks that "vice sometimes by action is dignified." All around Juliet and Romeo, people have lost or abandoned their own better purposes. Consequences of using questionable means to serve defensible intentions multiply.
The bright, colorful scene darkens, fraught with sorrow, as Death stalks, threatening old and young alike.

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Twelfth Night
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

In a prospering seaside realm, a duke and a countess have been indulging notions: he has decided she is to be his wife; she has vowed to forego marriage.
Among her householders, two questless knights carouse nightly, despite efforts of the lady's waiting-gentlewoman to keep the peace, and they annoy the prim, officious steward. Countess Olivia's bright jester brings dry humor to both courts: he's moonlighting -- saving money in hopes of marrying a woman at Duke Orsino's.
Just when one knight's parasitic decadence has upset the tenuously balanced calm, a shipwreck brings two young strangers to Illyria. The duke soon recruits one of them to serve as his surrogate suitor. The countess has already rejected Orsino, but she is strongly attracted to his vivacious emissary -- a woman disguised as a man.
Rascality and trickery enliven the fast action when the imposter, who has fallen in love with the duke, makes dutiful attempts to court Olivia -- who falls in love with the man the stranger seems to be.
Still, wrongdoing is chastised, prisoners are freed, and good hearts unite to prevail in this delightful gambol.

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The Taming of the Shrew
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

We're not alone in watching this piece: Christopher Sly, a neer-do-well drinker, as unsuccessful with females as with life, views a paradigmatic tale in which his favored conception of himself -- as a bold, swashbuckling male -- encounters his dourest notion of women as cold and domineering. Could a revised outlook mean happier times for him?
You and I need no such straightening out, of course, so we can enjoy the hearty, often hilarious encounters between two strong, intelligent people: a rambunctious country gentleman who, naively intending to make a routine acquisition for his estate -- a wife -- discovers, joyfully, a lifelong partner; and an urban gentlewoman so determined not to be treated as property that she has let anger define her falsely.
The acerbic lady has a younger sister whose predicaments -- being assailed by a sibling, restricted by a parent, pursued by unwanted suitors too old and too foolish -- match the trials of many girls becoming adults today -- or ever.
But there is a partner for her as well; sent to the college town to study, that young gentleman instead finds himself teaching -- in disguise. Still, he does begin to learn.
The sisters' three tutors -- every one an imposter -- meet varying results, but in the end, all will get what they need.
Will Christopher?
Will we?

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Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

At the time of this story, proud Spaniards control Italy -- and Sicily, where Aragon's fortyish prince and two of his officers come to visit the local governor just after their troops have defeated an uprising.
The three bachelors share a cavalier outlook. The dashing young Claudio finds that his initial interest in the governor's beautiful twenty-something daughter, Hero, has greatly increased since his pre-war visit; handsome Benedick, more seasoned, and with a playboy's predilections, rediscovers a previous conquest, the lovely Lady Beatrice, also thirty -- who remembers his amorous attentions all too well.
The prince's illegitimate brother had stirred up the recent insurrection; now pardoned, he, too, is a guest -- and is soon plotting against the peace of Governor Leonato's household in order to avenge his defeat, resented most of all for Claudio's part in it.
Meanwhile the young couple joins with the prince in a scheme to liberate the more sophisticated pair, whose contests in cleverness keep them from each other.
Witty exchanges, indignant confrontations and stunned epiphanies follow. When a calamity intrudes, a priest devises a purgatorial pause; and the law intercedes, its muddling minions and their deputies helping, comically, to clarify the situation -- despite not understanding it themselves.

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Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

On vivid display in this story of magnificent lovers is a colorful panorama of republican Rome as it becomes the Roman Empire, revealing some of the dynamics of dynasty. After the dictator's assassination, a triumvirate soon becomes a quadrumvirate; but two members fall, leaving power split between magnificent competing egos: those of Octavius Caesar, the careful, calculating executive who accretes others winnings; and Mark Antony, the bon vivant, a valiant fighter and leader of men who achieves success in conflict.
They are well matched in intelligence, and both lay claim to legendary heritage, Octavius from his grand-uncle Julius, widely, if mistakenly, regarded as his father; Mark from -- Hercules.
As whole kingdoms are won, lost, and given away in the Mediterranean basin, one other potentate has proven to be a skillful survivor: Queen Cleopatra, an indomitable personality whose long ancestry reflects another age, the Greeks' earlier domination of Egypt. She has charmed her country's native population -- and intrigued the Italians sent south to deal with her.
Her ardent affair with Antony is marked by paramours' usual bickering, tantrums and jealousy -- and is challenged by threats from pirates, attacks out of the east by armies of Parthian invaders, and a rebellion -- led by Antony's wife -- against Rome.
Leading the famous naval and land battles against Octavius at Actium, the pair find themselves at sea: Antony realizes that passion has taken over his judgment, Cleopatra learns that she has commandeered more than even she can control.
The long age of towering, heroic figures is being subsumed by the orderly era of Caesar Augustus (63 B.C.-A.D. 14) and his Pax Romana. And the Prince of Peace will soon provide a new paradigm.
Yet the extraordinary lovers finally define themselves: personally powerful, unyieldingly triumphant.

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As You Like It
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

This charming fable of foibles might be called "Take Your Choice." It presents a spectrum of outlooks on love: a cynical jester reluctantly accepts marriage as the dubious remedy for urgent needs; a suffering suitor sees his pathetic, self-effacing insecurity contrasted with the powerful appeal of confident contempt; a handsome young gentleman's strengths of build and character intrigue a lady, arousing the young woman's desire, while his earnest naivete attracts her even more -- and stirs her prankish imagination.
When two vivacious gentlewomen set out in disguise, venturing defiantly from palace to pasture to escape tyranny and to establish new lives, they encounter a band of men much like those of Robin Hood in this, Shakespeare's send-up of silliness in the pastoral romances popular in his day.
Imbalance is exposed: when responses are too strong or too weak; when power and wealth are overly craved or improperly managed; and when dissonance between intelligence and emotion hampers both. To the ancient forest of Arden, men and women bring a wealth of hope, as they try to find -- and to deserve -- mature companionship.
Experience and music bring new wisdom and harmony to each who will take a part in the song.

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Othello
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Venice, a powerful city-state with far-flung outposts, faces a dangerous Eastern opponent, the Ottoman Empire, and lords of the Signiory have recruited a Mauritanian general -- a prince, although they don't know it -- to command their Mediterranean defenses.
Othello is an accomplished, experienced warrior, and he already has a victory in the city: the rugged, charming raconteur has won the heart of Desdemona, beautiful daughter of a wealthy Venetian nobleman, a senator.
But the general has also made an enemy, a veteran soldier he passed over when naming his lieutenant. In his efforts to supplant Cassio as Othello's chief officer, Iago, an unscrupulous manipulator, intends to make treacherous use of a foolish fop who lusts after the Moor's new wife.
When the Turkish fleet threatens two of Venice's vital island holdings, the story's action moves -- through a violent storm at sea -- to Cyprus, where anxiety is growing as enemy ships approach.
The ruthless ensign -- suspecting others of sins matching his own -- launches intrigues to torment the foreigner who slighted him. Iago has a potion to weaken the general, and he plans to administer a more potent poison: jealousy. A trusted adversary, he can instill doubts in Othello's mind; half-truths bolster outright lies in a vicious scheme of callous betrayal.
Othello's great, passionate strength is turned against him, and the ensign incites mayhem -- and murder.

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A Midsummer Night's Dream
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

In golden-age Athens, a falling-out between rulers of the faerie world has brought dissonance to humankind's grosser sphere, altering even the seasons.
The fairies' King Oberon plays a trick on his defiant wife -- and, inadvertently, on some young Athenians, two gentlewomen and two gentlemen -- by turning coup d'oeil into love at first sight.
Meanwhile, the city-state's duke is soon to marry Titania, queen of the Amazons, his former enemy, and several inept local tradesmen hope to win favor at the new court by presenting a play during the wedding celebration. The bunglers' rehearsal in the woods so tickles the mischievous sprite Puck that, magically, he makes the chief ass look like a donkey.
As lovers argue, stumbling in the dark, attraction based on appearance alone -- and jealousy stemming from pride -- seem even sillier than they usually do.
Will the noble couples' foolish illusions fall away? Will Oberon come to see better? Can the parallel realms return to harmony?

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Hamlet
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Of all Shakespeare plays, Hamlet is probably read the most, because so many of us return repeatedly; first-timers are excited by fast action and rising suspense, and as we grow in experience, insight and acuity, we're increasingly fascinated by the evolving intrigues, and the bold, complex protagonist's sardonic responses to challenge -- despite threats to his life.
The drama begins in an edgy Denmark; soon after the king has died, his brother, who now rules the nation, is confirming his new power, and moving to thwart a foreign prince's plan to invade.
A university student, back from Germany for the funeral and coronation at Elsinore, is amazed to witness a midnight visit by a ghost: that of the dead monarch. Horatio informs his college friend Prince Hamlet that his late father, King Hamlet, haunts the castle's battlements.
The prince, soon burdened with information that might be a demonic ruse -- and which at best he should not have -- is given a deadly assignment. But is it revenge -- or damnable regicide? He decides he must try to learn the truth.
As he investigates, his fiancee is turned against him, and two more college students are brought home from Wittenberg to spy on him. Deadly plots against the prince ensue, leading to a narrow escape.
The ploys and countering moves involve soldiers, pirates, and a troupe of traveling actors, as Hamlet copes with a poisonous melange of past sins and present villainy, and comes to terms with limitations to what a thinking person may do in good conscience.

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King Lear
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

A long-flattered, white-bearded monarch intends to retain the pleasant perquisites of his reign, while abdicating responsibility for it. Dividing both the realm's territory and its governance, he unleashes forces that will propel the emerging country into a newer era.
Ambition and jealous rivalry provoke conniving competition that is to have profound consequences for the king's three grown daughters -- eventually including war, as authority devolves to become less cavalier, more responsive. In the process, members of two generations -- the former sovereign, along with those who are fiercely devoted to him, and younger nobles -- undergo harrowing ordeals that alter their lives, and expose the costs of grandeur's excess.
"Magnificent" understates the epic-scale breadth, depth, and intensity of this powerfully moving story, set in ancient Britain and marking an early shift from royal pride in raw power to truly regal empathy and responsibility, as God's regent learns, painfully, about himself, and about the lives of the least of his island nation's children.

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The Tempest
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

This wonderful parable looks at power and responsibility; but it's about growth in compassion -- however difficult or late, and it centers on strength of the human heart.
In the past, Duke Prospero of Milan had immersed himself in studying occult means of control, but he abdicated, in effect, from its political exercise. As a result he's been marooned on a mysterious, uncharted island -- where ability and effectiveness, not rank, must enable him.
The paradisiacal setting has been violated twice by people: first, an evil sorceress was isolated there to bear her child, then die; she did both, but left the isle's sovereign, Ariel, a carefree, effervescent spirit, cruelly imprisoned. Her untutored son, Caliban, remained loose, living as an animal -- a muscular and wild one.
Then came the magician, with his sweetly innocent daughter. Prospero met the islanders, uncivilized natives, and unshackled the opalescent one. Feeling no obligation, Ariel, born aimlessly capricious, has learned, as Prospero's lieutenant, to lead other fantastical beings purposefully -- and to weigh some peculiarly human traits. Caliban, whose physical strength at pubescence required restraining, is yet ungoverned by moral understanding; he remains surly and resentful, limited to drudgery.
Both the flighty aide and the grudging slave have adopted society's language, and thus acquired concomitant capacity for articulate thinking. Imagining, now, what they might do on their own, they wish to be released from accountability. But, lacking empathy or sympathy, either would wield raw power without meaningful goals -- and so would be dangerous.
Miranda, Prosperos daughter, has similarly great potential. The strong, imaginative young woman, just coming into her own, will soon need -- and deserve -- to be free.
Her father perceives the possibilities in all three, but now Fate has brought his enemies within reach, and he confines them under magical spells.
What will he try to achieve? Vengeance, he thinks. But even before he can effect his full designs, the cultured, mainland captives set upon themselves. Two of the lords plot to assassinate the King of Naples and usurp his realm.
And Caliban, who at first admires two royal servants, soon turns their drunken agenda to his own: killing the magician. Stephano, the king's butler, is eager to take possession of the island -- and of Miranda.
The exiled duke attempts to oppose the force of arms with intellectual powers, to counter illicit ambition and greed with gentle magnanimity.
If Prospero survives, how should he order things? Can the world be perfected? -- or even improved?
Those capable of growing -- including the magus -- do so in this remarkably hopeful tale.

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King Richard II
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

England has its problems in 1398, but King Richard II has been governing comfortably and confidently as the anointed temporal viceroy of God. Then, just as he plans a foreign adventure, festering issues bring troubles old and new to the fore.
Especially worrisome is a faction headed by one of Richard's advisors, old John of Gaunt, a conservative nobleman perturbed by the monarch's lavish spending and reliance on a coterie of sycophantic favorites, effects of his having been crowned in 1377 as a boy of ten; he first ruled under the guidance of highly influential uncles.
Gaunt tells his brother, the Duke of York, also one of Richard's uncles, that he fears for the future of the "royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, this berth of majesty, this other Eden, demi-paradise! ... This blessd plot, this earth, this realm, this England!"
When rival factions challenge his authority, even as the country verges on bankruptcy, Richard acts to end the threat, and fortuitously finds a source of funds for the invasion of Ireland, an undertaking to be bolstered by the Welsh.
But while he is away, dissatisfaction and dissension increase: rebellious aristocrats and their followers form an army that stirs crises of conscience, and divides Englishmen's loyalties. Approaching London, those in revolt are led by a scion of the House of Plantagenet. a paragon of newer thinking, a skilled and scheming politician: Gaunt's son, the Duke of Hereford and Earl of Derby -- Henry Bolingbroke.
Richard returns to find a changed nation -- and he must become a different man.

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Cymbeline
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Rome, under Emperor Caesar Augustus, is the hub of the western world, drawing sophisticated diplomats from many nations -- and an exile from a backward young country that Julius Caesar conquered a few years back: Britain, a league of tribes ruled by King Cymbeline.
The remarried widower's controlling new queen is a widow who had intended that her son, Cloten, wed the king's daughter, heir to his throne. But Princess Imogen preferred -- and married -- the exemplary young Leonatus, her friend since childhood. The orphaned son of a war hero, he was raised in the palace under Cymbeline's care.
The angry king has banished his son-in-law, and the young lady, a newlywed thus bereft of her husband, is confined to the castle, virtually a prisoner -- and afflicted by the continuing advances of the clod Cloten.
At Rome, Leonatus's host, a friend of his late father's, welcomes him; but other nobles, cynical men of the world in the international city, hold the visitor and his island nation in contempt. One arrogant Italian roue even wagers with the emigre that he can easily seduce the princess at Lud's Town, as London was then called. He is soon on his way -- warned that, more than the loss of gold, his failure will be followed by a deadly duel with Leonatus.
Under the new queen's influence, Britain is refusing to send to Rome the monetary tribute it had been compelled to pay by the Empire.
Caesar's emissary warns Cymbeline of war, and Rome orders its local gentlemen to serve as officers for what is expected to be a brief expedition -- and Leonatus finds himself drafted to go with them.
As the imperial force prepares, in Wales, to invade Britain, two hardy young men, hunters living near by in a cavern with their father, a former British commander, want to take part in the fight.
Imogen goes to Wales to meet her husband, Cloten follows her to find and kill Leonatus, and that gentleman arrives in Britain with the Romans' army -- expected to fight against his homeland.
The war will bring major changes to all, but none is what they anticipate.

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The Comedy of Errors
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Sheer, frenetic fun! Shakespeare updates elements of Plautus's farcical Roman comedy Menaechmi from two centuries B.C., and, in his own wonderful way, adds to it -- doubling the characters' confusion in his shortest, fastest-paced play.
A Sicilian nobleman of thirty-three and his trusted servant-companion come to Ephesus, the capital of a city-state in Asia Minor, after a seven year of searching for the twin brother of each, from whom they were separated as infants after a shipwreck.
There they encounter -- but don't recognize -- the noble twin, who has served his duke as a warrior, has married well, and is now a wealthy, respected citizen of Ephesus. Antipholus's large household includes his scolding wife, her soft-spoken, unmarried sister, and Dromio, his chronically, comically complaining servant.
Poor Antipholus! -- his orderly life of magnanimity is thrown into hilarious turmoil by his wife's jealous dissatisfaction, an ill-advised retaliation, and the contretemps ensuing from her meeting his brother and his man -- also called Antipholus and Dromio after a storm-bred misunderstanding at sea. The urbane Ephesian is frustrated further when complications about money spur demands and challenges among his business associates.
Antipholus grows increasingly exasperated, while his country counterpart is ever more wary of metropolitan decadence -- and all involved turn obstreperous, as an officer, a courtesan, and an exorcist join in the chaotic mix-ups.
With a man's life in jeopardy -- the headsman is at hand -- Duke Solinus must sort out the impossibly conflicting accusations and claims voiced by indignant men and women.

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Titus Andronicus
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Stories of violence and vengeance were as popular In Shakespeare's day as they are now; he provided theater-goers with this tale illustrating consequences, personal and public, of callousness.
It evolves around Titus Andronicus, an aging Roman general whose service to his country is almost legendary. He returns to the capital in triumph, bringing prisoners captured during his latest foreign conquest, the Goths -- including their queen. The ruthless warrior will soon learn how dangerous domestic peacetime can be.
The emperor has died, and a successor is to be chosen. Titus's grown daughter is engaged to marry a candidate who is a forward-looking advocate of freedom; but the arrogant, blindly loyal warrior dutifully endorses a man of his own stripe to rule. The new sovereign quickly asserts power -- and dishes out, contemptuously, a measure of punishment to Titus, whom he had feared as a rival, and now despises for interfering with a momentous occasion.
Titus, having endured extraordinary family losses during a career of combat in which he strived to augment the Andronici reputation, built over generations, is loath to believe that, despite his 40-year history of unquestioning bravery and sacrifice, he could be held in disdain by the aristocrats for whom he fought and suffered.
Death does not frighten the soldier; he has seen and dealt out too much of it. But the combined pain of humiliation and injuries finally brings him new perception -- and provokes a powerful response: dreadful retribution.

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Timon of Athens
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

What will become of Lord Timon? The renowned former general has an addiction: he is generous to a fault. But he has yet to take the first step toward recovery.
His regular -- if uninvited -- supper guest, Apemantus, a wryly sarcastic cynic, tries to warn him. His loyal, long-suffering and good-hearted steward, Flavius, works to help him. His closest friend, Alcibiades, an army general with whom he once served golden-age Athens -- both achieved great military success -- has troubles of his own, now that the war with Sparta is over.
But no matter how wealthy the host nor how obsequious his sycophants, parasites eventually have a debilitating effect; Timon finds that he must turn to his friends, asking for help from those who have long received his many splendid gifts.
When, citing various specious reasons, they all turn him down, Timon's outlook turns to righteous indignation -- and disgust. The encomia of his times in beneficence are succeeded by fiery diatribes of contempt.
But even after he becomes an ascetic, living in a cave, Timon is plagued by visitors. The irascible hermit surprises them by urging any who find him to assail ungrateful mankind -- and by offering to pay them to do it.
The principals' dry aside remarks, their unintentionally revealing comments, and their towering confrontational speeches, glorying in sardonic extravagance, are -- for the audience -- hilarious, as men behave like... well, men.
Will Timon the Athenian ever learn the meaning of golden mean?

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Pericles
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

This piquant pastiche of marvelous adventures is reminiscent (to us today) of Scheherazade's Arabian Nights tales; but, further, it explores maturation, as Pericles proceeds from proud, princely naivete to a kingly kind of humility.
Sailing an imaginary Mediterranean -- smaller, and governed by unpredictable Neptune, whose compass-point winds promote the picaresque -- the peripatetic prince visits a decadent king's court, rescues the starving provincials of another land, is helped by three lowly but lively fishermen, and competes in a colorful tournament of chivalry.
And, guided along by a spry writer-friend of Chaucer's -- one who relishes the tallest of tales -- we also travel with Pericles' daughter Marina to encounter a murderer, pirates, and the waterfront denizens of a seedy house of prostitution.
The bad -- those who can choose, yet opt for evil -- are punished, while the good -- those beneficent souls who are true to themselves and to others -- are rewarded. The ugly stay ugly.
At length, a royal voyager who once trusted everyone becomes a miserable fugitive from home, a recluse who can respond to no one.
But a distant voice will stir sleeping love and devotion -- and both faith and enduring faithfulness will prompt a goddess to offer a second chance.

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Coriolanus
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Heated confrontations abound in this story of a beleaguered Roman commander during the republic's early days.
As a noble youth, Caius Martius helped oust the Tarquin monarch, and he has long been highly successful in fighting the city-state's enemies. The Senate and aristocracy adore him, even if his autocratic manner, acceptable to military subordinates, antagonizes the general public's working citizens: merchants, tradesmen and city laborers, country squires and farm hands.
Energetic and ruthless, he wins when he goes to war; but now he must seek commoners' approval for a post in governing at home, and his great but disdainful vigor cripples him. Expressing outspoken contempt for "the people," he irks two of their tribunes, who fear that his hyper-conservatism will curb -- or even eliminate -- their new powers; they become his political opponents.
But armed foreign enemies soon threaten Rome from the south -- and they're being led by Martius's own indefatigable rival, Tullus Aufidius, commander of the Volces' army.
The Roman general is always besieged: at home, his domineering mother demands performance; in the capitol, the tribunes undermine him, even as the Senate is sending him to fight invaders; and then on the battlefield at Corioli, Volscian troops surprise and overwhelm the conscripted commoners he cavalierly commands.
Surrounded and unappreciated, the great warrior finally must rebel -- with devastating results.

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Henry V
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

A year into his reign, King Henry V faces major issues: government revenue has declined, because the Church, not taxed, has inherited much land; and arguments have been raised that England's king is the rightful heir to yet another throne.
The Archbishop of Canterbury offers Church contributions to an effort -- which will surely involve war -- to make Henry king of France.
When the arrogant French prince known as the Dauphin sends a highly insulting reply to the initial query about succession, Henry resolves to press the matter in the field under arms.
As a youth he had disguised his strength of character in private pursuits; now, in his late twenties, he will be severely tested: as a national leader, responsible for the prosperity of hundreds of thousands, and as a wartime commander.
But even before he sets sail, problems emerge: several nobles have been suborned, and some other Englishmen are revisiting private quarrels.
Despite the Dauphin's glib assurances, the French king and his key advisors are nervous.
Henry's forces lay siege to Harfleur on the Seine, and after some fighting, the city surrenders. The king leads English troops back north, toward the safety of its long-held territory in Calais.
The French, embarrassed by his success, intend to stop him, and two armies do battle in 1415 at Agincourt -- where the English are outnumbered five-to-one.
The hours before the fighting reveal the Dauphin's foolishness, apparent even to the French commander, and Henry's regal presence, bolstered by confidence and faith, and his leadership: he heartens his "band of brothers" with a genuine concern for honest commoners.
In peace talks at Paris, France agrees to all of England's terms, but Henry faces another challenge: winning the heart of Princess Katherine of France.

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Henry VI, Part 1
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Even as many in France are rebelling against English dominion there, in England powerful domestic forces come into dire conflict. The Duke of Gloucester, the boy-king's uncle, serves as his guardian, and thus is effectively in command. But contesting with him for control is another uncle, the ambitious -- and unscrupulous -- Bishop of Winchester.
Younger men, too, are at odds: the Duke of Somerset and Richard Plantagenet. A law-school argument leads to insults, then to formation of angry factions with emblems: red roses counter white ones. Richard hopes the king will soon create him Duke of York, thus restoring family inheritance, despite his father's having been executed for treason.
Assailed by the French, the almost-mythical English military hero Lord Talbot finds himself unsupported by his own nation: he lacks troops, funds -- even food. And soon he faces a revivified enemy force led by a surprising opponent: a young woman in armor. Her name is Joan.

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Henry VI, Part 2
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

A young king meets and marries his French bride, but the Lancastrian monarchy -- thought illegitimate by many, and personified by a kind-hearted but weak ruler -- is increasingly threatened: by the Duke of York and his sons Edward and Richard; by the Dukes of Somerset and Buckingham; by the Earl of Salisbury and his son, the Earl of Warwick; by Cardinal Beaufort, the Bishop of Winchester; by an uprising devised by York and fomented by Jack Cade; and by the conniving of the Duke of Suffolk and his self-centered lover -- the queen.
An explosive dead-of-night seance brings prophecies of death; pirates seize a nobleman; a duchess is banished -- and murder strikes a duke. Meanwhile, Ireland is in open rebellion, and England loses the holdings in France won in battle by Henry V.
And then, when Richard, Duke of York, demands the crown, forces supporting him collide in combat with those of the king.

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Henry VI, Part 3
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

English nobles' intense struggles for power lead to confrontations in London, to pledges of fealty made but later forsworn -- and to a disastrous series of back-and-forth battles.
The domineering queen raises an army to challenge Yorkists' power under King Henry's anemic, provisional rule, and to defend her young son's right of succession to the throne.
Two of the Duke of York's grown sons, Edward and Richard, persuade him to seize the crown -- but find that they must first contend with Margaret's advancing royal troops.
The Earl of Warwick supports Edward, and, after furious warfare bloodies the farmland of Yorkshire, the York faction declares its leader King Edward IV.
Kingmaker Warwick plans for a calming alliance with the adversarial French through a marriage of Edward to King Louis XI's sister-in-law. But even as the earl goes to France to arrange it, Edward becomes enamored of a beautiful English widow -- and makes her his queen.
When King Louis learns that Edward is already married, he offers the furiously embarrassed Warwick and England's former queen troops with which to invade England and restore the House of Lancaster to its reign.
Margaret accomplishes that, and Henry VI returns to the throne.
But then Edward of York, too, seeks help from across the channel -- in Brittany. His new army joins his brother Richard's troops in England, and after regaining possession of the crown, they head for Coventry, intending to fight a decisive battle with forces of the erstwhile queen.

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Richard III
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

England is working toward recovery in the prosperous peace following battles that put Edward IV of the Yorkist faction on the throne; but his younger brother Richard, whom he has just elevated to Duke of Gloucester, remains angry. Long tormented by others' reactions to a misshapen body, he has allowed his mind to be warped too.
His ambition extends to the crown, but the path to it is crowded: the king has a new son; Richard's brother George is older than he; and Henry, Earl of Richmond and the Lancastrians' scion, has grown to manhood during his self-imposed exile in France.
Undaunted -- and lacking any moral constraint -- Richard has begun an incessant campaign of cynical, malevolent deception to create factions and propel them into conflict.
His lies are stunning in their boldness -- and irony; much of what he says is the opposite of what he means -- and he finds ambitious allies and agents to further his murderous plotting.
Will he go too far, even for them?

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Love's Labours Lost
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

This story is a continual delight, a veritable parade of lively language, resplendent with scintillating intellectual exchanges and low comedy, beautiful poems and childish taunts, courtly finesse and embarrassing encounters.
The King of Navarre and three of his noblemen have no sooner committed to devoting three years to improving their minds, in part by shunning female companionship, than the Princess of France arrives with three lovely ladies. Attention to the noblewomen supersedes the plan, of course.
During their ascetic regimen -- with occasional amusement by a pompous Spaniard and a rustic local buffoon -- the Pyrenean lords had intended to be bookishly studious. They find that they do indeed have much to learn: the gentlewomen will not be won as easily as the suitors expect.
Their courtship efforts include sonneteering, a visit by four flirtatious "Russians" in black cassocks, and a pageant of historical Worthies performed earnestly but comically by its cast: the loquacious, verbose local schoolmaster and curate, a sponging knight and his wise-cracking young page, and the swain Costard -- a yokel who is surely the most inept deliverer of letters ever.
Making glib use of sophistry, the clever lads can quickly convince themselves of anything; persuading others, though....
And the princess has a serious diplomatic task to accomplish for her ailing father, left at home. Her key gambit is soon to be exposed. Will her mission fail?

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The Merry Wives of Windsor
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Nearing the age at which she's to inherit considerable wealth, a beautiful gentlewoman has three suitors: a young schoolteacher from the country, an immigrant French physician, and a London nobleman of limited means. Her father favors the Gloucestershire youth; her mother, the foreign doctor.
Anne's mother, Mistress Margaret Page, also finds herself being courted -- to her distress -- by a fat old knight, Sir John Falstaff. He resides nearby at Windsor's Garter Inn, where most of his time is spent in the tavern with his criminal cronies Pistol, Nym and Bardolph; all four are former soldiers.
The knight, a pensioner, is pressed for funds, and he has decided to remedy that by wooing the rich matron -- and her closest friend and neighbor, Mistress Alice Ford. Both gentlewomen are offended -- and indignant; they plot revenge.
Separately, Alice's husband, a jealous gentleman, learns of Falstaff's interest -- and Master Ford fears that she might be a willing accomplice. He sets about, in disguise, to find out.
Sir John's romantic forays are hilarious, as are tricks played on him, on the hot-tempered doctor, on a kindly Welsh cleric, and on the Garter's ebullient innkeeper.
When townsfolk gather after dark in Windsor Park to witness a rascal's humiliation, aided by children dressed as fairies, schemes are afoot for a midnight marriage.
The play's sparkling conclusion brings surprises -- for everyone!

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The Winter's Tale
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

The bleakest season of frost and snow on dead leaves will be followed by a warm spring of germinating greenery, then blooms and blossoms.
Optimism, too, is recurrent; and genuine repentance, even for dreadful wrongs, can lead to renewal and regeneration.
As this story begins, the lifelong friendship of two sovereigns is chilled when one's jealous anger during a midlife crisis afflicts -- infects -- his judgment, curtailing the legacy he had intended, and endangering the welfare of his entire kingdom.
But one strong woman's indignant outrage emboldens her to risk her life to defend the truth. And one man whose honor transcends both fealty and self-interest saves the life of another. Their courageous actions ultimately preserve some of the realms' best resources.
Before that, though, we visit -- aided by Father Time -- both royal courts, witness a rescue, laugh at the exploits of a clever con artist among good-hearted bumpkins during a country festival, and follow the trials of an earnest young couple -- a prince and a shepherd's daughter -- determined to share their love no matter what the cost.
As two people mature and come into their own, ready to face new challenges and to flourish as adults, dormant and long-hidden hopes are revived -- almost miraculously.

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King John
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

The bold and vigorous spirit of Richard the Lionheart, manifested in an illegitimate son, comes to the fore just as England begins another war with France -- which is supporting the claim of King John's nephew, a child named Arthur, that the English throne should be his.
John and the Queen Mother argue that possession of the crown implies God’s approval of his acting deputy, while the boy's mother insists that he was rightfully in line for the throne, not John -- who is therefore usurping. Neutral parties might side with her, but no one is disinterested: the French support young Arthur, but they also want to free their northern territories from the control of England; John will fight to retain those lands -- and the crown. Both sides are willing to invade -- each on the side of "right."
Their armies first meet outside the English-held French city of Angiers, whose walled-in burghers bar the main gates, saying they will honor their true king -- after combat has revealed which of the contenders he is. When initial fighting proves inconclusive, a compromise is offered.
But the Church of Rome, equally determined to preserve power and wealth, intervenes to demand more war, over a dispute with John -- who responds by imposing heavy taxation on its holdings in England.
The king's stealthy scheme to end a threat to his rule leads to crises of conscience for many of his countrymen. An invasion -- one supported by some dissatisfied English lords -- tests pledges and loyalties.
The wry new Richard -- a man of honor -- learns, after seasoning in combat and bearing the weight of leadership, that others’ vows of fealty may be worthless -- and short-lived, if challenged.
What happens if nobles' responsibility fails?
How will England emerge from these severe trials of loyalty and integrity?

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Measure for Measure
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Vienna’s bookish sovereign worries that his late father’s benevolent rule, which the young new duke has continued, was overly permissive, and bred a corrosive decadence.
Announcing urgent travels abroad, upon departure he appoints two noblemen, judges, to serve in his stead.
Lord Angelo is middle-aged, conservative, and apparently cold-blooded; he thinks strong law and severe, public punishment will subdue illicit behavior. Angelo is to govern, but advising him will be wise and kindly old Lord Escalus, who likes people -- understands them and why they act as they do.
The chief magistrate immediately moves to tear down suburban brothels, and he invokes a harsh statute, long unenforced, in order to make an example of a young nobleman: Claudio is sentenced to death for impregnating his bride-to-be.
The condemned’s sister, about to enter a convent as a novice, is encouraged by Claudio’s friend, the dissolute gentleman Lucio, to lodge a personal plea with Judge Angelo for clemency.
Isabella innocently makes an appeal to him -- but he, suddenly finding himself overwhelmed by long-pent-up desire, offers to spare her brother in exchange for sex.
Duke Vincentio, hoping to witness improvement in the city-state’s capital, has remained in town disguised as a monk. Walking among the street’s colorful characters, he finds out what contempt for authority the lax governance has generated -- but he fears the effects of his surrogate’s stern intolerance.
Then, at the jail, Vincentio learns of Angelo’s foul proposition --  rejected by the lady -- and begins, as “Father Lodowick,” a plan to set things right.
His full intention is to distribute measures of reward and retribution in keeping with both his pledge to exercise, priestly, a benevolent correction and his own responsibility as ruler to curb wrongdoing -- and to punish it..
Can he manage that -- before Claudio is executed? The time is rapidly approaching; danger and tension grow, even as the duke’s schemes unfold.

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Henry VIII
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

The initial title for this account of circumstances preceding the birth of Queen Elizabeth I, All Is True, was wry; no staged portrayal of the controversial King Henry VIII could be “the whole truth,” an ineffable gestalt contained only in the mind of God -- and if the play had dealt candidly with certain aspects of Henry’s notoriety, the author and other actors might have faced trial for treason.
England had experienced many years of growth under Elizabeth, and was enjoying further prosperity during King James’s early reign; destiny seemed to be smiling warmly upon Britons. The play reveals that their situation might have been quite different: scheming by an ambitious and callous Lord Chancellor, and conspiracy among some of the King’s Council against men truly loyal to the nation and its ruler threatened the golden future prophesied by patriots.
The Globe introduces Elizabeth’s father as a midlife Henry VIII who wants a son and heir; that’s one of the desires which move him to remarry.
The way is troubled, though, and his wife -- the Queen of England -- is called to trial, as is the Archbishop of Canterbury. We witness, with the public, the stern accusations and artful defenses -- but after we’ve learned the principals’ private motives and feelings.
New faiths were developing in Europe, and among the consequences of England’s contentions will be changes in its people’s professing of religion, if not always their beliefs.
Still, in this roseate rendition of the facts, those involved profit from experience, and the king’s better judgment allows him to welcome the arrival of a very promising princess.
In its sparking, charming conclusion the play brings surprises -- for everyone!

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Troilus and Cressida
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Sardonic wit suffuses this insider’s view of the Trojan War’s eighth year. Our guide is a knight in unshining armor; his tale is hardly one of chivalrous valor. It contradicts, painfully, the patina of patriotism later applied to the decade-long conflict by poets, in their spinning of glorious legends from the mundane misery experienced in the field.
A seer serving the Greeks besieging Troy envisions nothing helpful to them, given their stubborn arrogance; and the Trojan princess who actually can foresee is no longer believed.
We witness much along with Thersites, a civilian camp-follower who exercises caustic candor: the cynic can find nothing good in anyone, and his scorn spares no one. He is often childish, but always colorfully vicious.
One of the several Greek kings besieging Troy tries to achieve military progress by subterfuge: the astute and wily Ulysses has a plan to spur his side’s strongest, most famous fighters, Achilles and Ajax, who have grown lazy, back into action -- and another to get the Trojans’ chief champions, Hector and Troilus, to face them on the field.
Nothing is as one might expect: the invaders want to go home, but the beleaguered Trojans induce them to stay; renowned warriors’ relationships are somewhat less than manly; and an attractive young couple is betrayed by their elders -- on both sides.

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All's Well That Ends Well
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

A French noblemen is excited: having inherited a title at eighteen, he is going to Paris and its royal court, accompanied by a former servant, his friend since childhood. They eagerly anticipate gains in experience and reputation -- with beautiful women at the palace, and as gallant officers, volunteers in a foreign civil war.
But Count Bertram’s mother wants him to develop the virtues he inherited from his late father, and she asks an old-fashioned family mentor, the fiery Lord Lafeu, to guide him.
Left behind in the widow’s household at Rousillon is the daughter of a famous physician, a commoner whose legacy is medicines -- including an almost-magical potion he formulated, as it happens, for the very illness now troubling the king.
When Helen, seventeen, proposes offering the sovereign that cure, the wise dowager, realizing that her young charge is in love with Bertram, encourages her to go to the capital.
There, though, the count’s hopes for boudoir conquest and horseback valor are soon quashed: the king considers him too young for war; instead of being commissioned as an officer, Bertram is consigned to marriage -- condemned to the dullness of domesticity, in his view.
The spirited youth rebels, and heads for the war in Italy with his friend, the sprightly upstart Parolles. Older and already a captain in the Duke of Florence’s army, the officer has run afoul of Lafeu, and is eager to return to military life.
The lovely young woman who adores Bertram decides she must strive, somehow, to win him.
In Tuscany, Bertram and Parolles again find themselves thwarted: the count in romance, the captain in ambition.
Can Helen, the wholesome healer, manage to corral the wild stallion she loves? Both have inherited qualities of nobility; will his native noblesse respond to her gentle ministration? She develops a tricky, risky scheme….

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King Henry IV, Part 1
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

Complete in itself (as are all of Shakespeare’s plays), this highly popular and exciting drama reveals the turbulent aftermath of King Richard II's being deposed. His successor, Henry IV, must now face those bent on taking the crown from him -- including his former allies Lords Worcester and Northumberland, and the volatile young Hotspur, along with powerful clan leaders in Scotland and Wales.
We meet the king's eldest son, Henry -- Hal, as Sir John Falstaff, a fat, aging knight calls him -- who keeps apart from palace life, alienated from his usurping father. In an Eastcheap tavern the prince studies the lives and ways of London commoners, especially those who -- like the king -- prosper by taking from others, yet vigorously assert a claim to doing so. He consorts with them, but takes no part in their debauchery or crimes, and discreetly makes restitution to their victims.
But the times are increasingly troubled: the late John of Gaunt's grim prophecy of civil war appears to be nearing fulfillment, and opposing armies soon face each other -- with England's throne as the prize.

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King Henry IV, Part 2
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

The king is sick and miserable. Friends have become foes, and forces have been raised in rebellion by Lord Mowbray and the Archbishop of York; but Henry’s heir, the Prince of Wales, seems to be a dissolute idler whose younger brother John must take up the slack to lead royal troops against the insurrection.
The dissidents, too, have reason to worry: they are relying on help from the Earl of Northumberland -- who failed to join them during the disastrous battle at Shrewsbury.
We visit the London tavern where an old regular, Sir John Falstaff, again carouses with criminals and courtesans, while under an order to begin, as a conscripted infantry captain, drafting soldiers from the countryside on his way to fight in support of Prince John.
John of Lancaster confronts the rebels’ army in Yorkshire -- where even Falstaff’s pathetic contingent finally arrives -- and offers to redress their grievances.
Returning by way of Gloucestershire, Falstaff drinks and dines with two old acquaintances who reminisce about their rambunctious days together long ago in law school; he intends to fleece one, Robert Shallow, a justice of the peace. But their bucolic idyll is cut short by news from London.
The knight rushes to the capital, eager to join in the high life of English aristocracy.
Prince Hal has become King Henry V.

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The Two Gentlemen of Verona
by William Shakespeare

Presented by Paul W. Collins

Footnote-free narrative incorporating
Shakespeare's dialogue

In this charming tale we see two young couples mature; they must cope with the onset of romantic love -- and of desire. One relationship is centered in religious faith; the other trusts to antiquated attitudes that prove no longer viable.
The boys, lifelong friends, are bookish virgins. When the elder, Valentine, who considers himself worldly, goes to the duchy's capital, eager for sexual conquests at the palace, the younger stays at home in Verona to be with the girl whom he has targeted as his “love" -- the kind he has read about in the literature of chivalry.
At the urbane royal court in Milan, the cocky country youth is so naive -- to the vast amusement of his page -- as not to see that the duke’s daughter reciprocates his interest. Posturing forgotten, his intention is fully honorable, and soon the chaste, high-minded pair, Valentine and Silvia, are betrothed, even though her father wants her to marry a wealthy but pompous gentleman -- a term that's examined further.
Then the younger boy's father sends him to gain savoir faire at the regal court. When shy Proteus bids Julia goodbye, he primly turns down a kiss; but, at her prompting, they exchange rings -- and pledges. He goes to Milan, reluctant to leave his comfortable bond, but intrigued by exciting new possibilities.
And as soon as Proteus sees the beautiful and poised Silvia, he discovers lust -- with an intensity that, growing, overwhelms him.
The court becomes the scene of intrigue. Outlooks have been reversed: Valentine, who intended to be a playboy, has fallen in love; puritanical Proteus has turned from vapid dreamer to crafty predator -- and he is taking lustful aim at his best friend's fiancee.
In Verona, meanwhile, Julia misses her idealized lover. Unwilling to wait without him, she disguises herself -- for safety, as a boy -- and travels alone to Milan.
Deception and betrayal lead to a banishment; meetings are held by starlight; conspirators plot a daring escape; and brigands seize travelers in hope of extracting ransom.
The two young gentlewomen are tested, and they learn much about their lovers -- and themselves.
A pair of frisky pages serve as wry witnesses while simply trying to keep up, in this fast-paced, knowing story.

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Note: The spoken lines from Shakespeare's dramas are in the public domain, as is the Globe edition (1864) of his plays, which provided the basic text of speeches in these new versions. But Macbeth, by William Shakespeare:
Presented by Paul W. Collins; Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; The Merchant
of Venice, by William Shakespeare: presented by Paul W. Collins; Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Twelfth Night, by William Shakespeare: presented by Paul W. Collins, The Taming of the Shrew, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Much Ado About Nothing, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Antony and Cleopatra, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; As You Like It, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Othello, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; A Midsummer Night's Dream, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Hamlet, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; King Lear, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; The Tempest, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; King Richard II, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Cymbeline, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; The Comedy of Errors, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Titus Andronicus, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Timon of Athens, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Pericles, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins; Coriolanus, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Henry V, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Henry VI, Part 1, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Henry VI, Part 2, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Henry VI, Part 3, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins,  Richard III, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Love's Labours Lost, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, The Merry Wives of Windsor, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, King John by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Henry VIII by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, All's Well That Ends Well by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, King Henry IV, Part 1, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, King Henry IV, Part 2, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, and The Two Gentlemen of Verona, by William Shakespeare: Presented by Paul W. Collins, are copyrighted works, and are made available for your personal use only, in reading and study. They may not lawfully be performed, copied, or further distributed in any form without the author's written permission.

Student, beware: These are presentations, not scholarly works, so you should be sure your teacher, instructor or professor considers them acceptable as references before quoting characters' comments or thoughts from them in your report or term paper.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) wrote plays for London’s Globe theater, owned by his acting company, which often performed
for Queen Elizabeth and King James. Today his work is perpetually in performance around the world, heard live and by radio and recording, and seen on stage and screen: cinema, television and digital display.

Paul W. Collins, a former news reporter, copy editor, public relations manager and magazine editor, hired himself to make reading Hamlet—as opposed to studying it—more enjoyable. It was supposed to take a week or so; a decade later he’s still absorbed, every day, with narrating the dialogue from Shakespeare’s plays.