School is almost out and that means one thing: It's time for summer reading lists.
But this year, students who dread the idea of plodding through Shakespearean verse to learn the tales of star-crossed lovers and ruthless rulers can take heart. Wiley Publishers, famous (or infamous) for its Cliffs Notes study guides, has come out with Shakespeare in manga.
So far, Haml et, Julius Caesar, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth are available in the graphic novel style spawned in Japan and given full flower in the U.K. and U.S. Rated for ages 13 and older and priced at a mere $9.99, these abridged versions of the best-known plays in the English language are now vividly depicted in classic action-packed manga style: a kind of Saturday morning cartoon version of Shakespeare. The books, which came out in January, are classic manga: over-the-top illustrations depicting some of the great moments in Shakespeare with characterizations that might seem more suited to Harry Potter than the great Bard. They will be followed in a few months by Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter and Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
To read or not to read? That seems to be the only question.
"Not many people like Shakespeare, but I guess if they liked manga then they would like that kind of stuff," says Alex Yang, 17, an 11th-grader at Dulaney High School. "I think [having pictures] does help because you can actually understand what's going on."
Count Mari Shigeta, 14, among the manga enthusiasts. She spent her early childhood in Japan where manga debuted and now attends Edison Middle School in Champaign, Ill. Shigeta likes to read, but on the classics she was succinct: "It's just so much easier to read [Shakespeare] this way. The plays are really intimidating. Manga isn't."
Enthusiastic as some kids are about the new line of manga editions, adults aren't as sure that manga is the way to bring Shakespeare or other classics to the masses of kids moaning at the thought of reading beyond the YouTube curriculum.
While illustrated Shakespeare might be used occasionally to enhance a lecture, says Linda Storey, an 11th-grade English teacher at River Hill High School in Howard County, she wants the real thing in her classroom. "I'm a Shakespeare purist, and I don't want any other translation other than the Folger work for school."
