Showing results by author "William Shakespeare" in All Categories

While his son Price Hal spends time in the taverns, King Henry IV argues with his former ally Hotspur. Angry, Hotspur gathers a rebellion and Henry and Hal go to battle to stop him. Henry's army wins the battle, while Hal redeems himself from his wild youth and kills Hotspur.

Experience Romeo and Juliet as a powerful full-cast drama with entertaining and enlightening commentary that explains what's what and who's who as the plot unfolds. To help you get the most out of Shakespeare, the narrator offers historical insights and background information, so you can enjoy the jokes, appreciate the references, and get a real sense of Shakespeare's world.

An all-star cast including John Gielgud, Edith Evans, Anthony Quayle, and Peggy Ashcroft come together to read all 154 Sonnets.

Sir John Gielgud, Sir Michael Hordern, Leo McKern, and Edward Hardwicke star in this unabridged performance of Shakespeare's Richard II.

Twelfth Night, nowadays one of Shakespeare's best-loved and most-admired comedies, was not always so regarded: Samuel Pepys saw the play three times in the 1660s and judged it 'silly'. Modern audiences, critics, and directors seem better attuned to its delicate counter pointing of romance and realism....

The Comedy of Errors is likely the very first play Shakespeare ever wrote, and for that reason alone it deserves a special place in literary history. Yet, despite the author's lack of maturity, the play is unmistakably the work of a burgeoning master. A farce of a type that was wildly popular in Shakespeare's day, The Comedy of Errors transcends its genre, and is as accessible and as entertaining as any of the Bard's later comedies.

Sir Ian McKellen, William Squire, Trevor Nunn and Gary Watson perform Shakespeare's play that tells the story of King Henry V of England, focusing on events immediately before and after the Battle of Agincourt during the Hundred Years' War.

In Julius Caesar, there are no heroes, only heroic words spoken by men of ambition, arrogance, and jealousy. Yet Julius Caesar is also one of Shakespeare's most popular and polished works, a seamless blend of highly-stylized oratory and penetrating soliloquies that lays bare the innermost workings of the human mind.

Some of the greatest poets and lovers in the English language speak of their love in this seductive and romantic collection. Here are the voices of Romeo, Robert Burns, Lord Byron and many others.

Another in the great Caedmon Shakespeare series from the 1960s. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic scenes, and is best known for Shylock and the famous 'pound of flesh' speech. Shylock, a greedy Jewish money-lender, has lost his beloved daughter when she elopes with a man who belongs to a virulently anti-Semitic society.

A full-cast, unabridged performance with comprehensive commentary and analysis for any student to fully understand and appreciate the play. Universally accepted as Shakespeare's finest play, we peel back the layers of Hamlet to discover how and why it deserves such a place of honour in world literature.

All's Well That Ends Well finds Helena rewarded for her ministries to the sick with the choice of any husband she wishes. Her choice, Bertram, is unwilling to have her as his wife and sets her a number of seemingly impossible tasks to complete before he will relent.

Here are 160 minutes of extracted scenes from Shakespeare’s finest plays, read by a staggering cast. The plays of Shakespeare are fully alive only in performance, and the HarperCollins recordings of the complete plays offer scenes from The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing, As You Like It, Richard III, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Hamlet, Antony and Cleopatra, King Lear, Othello, The Winter's Tale and The Tempest.

Sir Rex Harrison and cast perform together in this wonderful production which is available for the first time on digital download. Much Ado about Nothing is a comedy by William Shakespeare about two pairs of lovers, Benedick and Beatrice, and Claudio and Hero. Benedick and Beatrice are engaged in a "merry war"; they both talk a mile a minute and proclaim their scorn for love, marriage, and each other.

The skies over ancient Rome blaze with terrifying portents, and soothsayers warn Julius Caesar of approaching doom. As conspiracy swirls through the city, Shakespeare explores the deep repercussions of political murder on the human heart. A classic tale of duplicity, betrayal and murder, masterfully performed by an all-star, all-American cast in this BBC co-production.

Antony and Cleopatra is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1607. It was first printed in the First Folio of 1623. The plot is based on Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Life of Marcus Antonius and follows the relationship between Cleopatra and Mark Antony from the time of the Parthian War to Cleopatra's suicide.

The multi-award winning SmartPass full-cast, unabridged performance with comprehensive commentary and analysis for any student to fully understand and appreciate the play.

William Shakespeare is of course England's greatest play right and revered the World over. The Merchant of Venice is a masterly tale and is on a par with many of his other works. In his creation of Venice Shakespeare revels in his characters and story. Perhaps best well known for the creation of the character Shylock in a world of money lending the play has survived admirably down the years. This play is performed by a quite magnificent cast and in the lead role of Shylock we have Michael Redgrave.

In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the boy hunter Adonis is the willing lover of Venus, the goddess of love, and dies accidentally. Shakespeare has Adonis reject Venus. Venus endlessly argues for making love, with Adonis uttering petulant protests.

This drama is a retelling of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedy, made accessible to younger listeners but still true to the Bard's original style and vocabulary. On a dark heath, Macbeth stumbles across three witches who can see into the future. What he hears will change everything. Encouraged by his wife, he decides to kill in order to gain the Scottish crown. How many people will die in his pursuit of power? With armies, ghosts and magic against him, will Macbeth survive in this tale of greed and betrayal?