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Why on earth did Jeanette Winterson agree to retell Shakespeare's Winter’s Tale?

In trying to be realistic, The Gap of Time: The Winter’s Tale Retold drains the original story of its poetry

3 October 2015

9:00 AM

3 October 2015

9:00 AM

The Gap of Time: The Winter’s Tale Retold Jeanette Winterson

Hogarth, pp.288, £16.99, ISBN: 9780804141352

It is fair to say that Jeanette Winterson is not Shakespeare, though I cannot imagine why any authors would accept these commissions to retell the plays — Margaret Atwood is lined up for The Tempest, Howard Jacobson for The Merchant of Venice — since the only certainty is that the texts will not be as good as Shakespeare.

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