Author: William Goldman
ISBN: 0151015449
Pages: 456
Release Date: October 8, 2007 (25th Anniversary Edition)
Publisher: Harcourt
Genre: Fantasy
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 5 out of 5 Bookworms
From Goodreads.com:
The Princess Bride is a true fantasy classic. William Goldman describes it as a "good parts version" of "S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure." Morgenstern's original was filled with details of Florinese history, court etiquette, and Mrs. Morgenstern's mostly complimentary views of the text. Much admired by academics, the "Classic Tale" nonetheless obscured what Mr. Goldman feels is a story that has everything: "Fencing. Fighting. Torture. Poison. True love. Hate. Revenge. Giants. Hunters. Bad men. Good men. Beautifulest ladies. Snakes. Spiders. Beasts of all natures and descriptions. Pain. Death. Brave men. Coward men. Strongest men. Chases. Escapes. Lies. Truths. Passion. Miracles."
Goldman frames the fairy tale with an "autobiographical" story: his father, who came from Florin, abridged the book as he read it to his son. Now, Goldman is publishing an abridged version, interspersed with comments on the parts he cut out.
Is The Princess Bride a critique of classics like Ivanhoe and The Three Musketeers, that smother a ripping yarn under elaborate prose? A wry look at the differences between fairy tales and real life? Simply a funny, frenetic adventure? No matter how you read it, you'll put it on your "keeper" shelf.
"A Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure" is a pretty accurate description of The Princess Bride by William Goldman. For anyone who watched and loved the movie adaptation of The Princess Bride as a child, this book will be a treat. As is often the case, the book is far better than the movie, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the movie version was an excellent adaptation of the book. Most of the dialogue was exactly the same and the sequence of events did not change much, if at all. Having seen the movie (many times) prior to reading the book, I was able to imagine the characters and their voices while I was reading, which made the experience that much more enjoyable.
Throughout the book, the author, William Goldman, sporadically interrupts the story to add a bit of commentary. At first, I thought that this constant interruption was going to get annoying but I was surprised that I didn't mind it after a while. Mr. Goldman is very funny and his commentary was often informative and interesting. And the brief history behind the writing (or abridging) of the book and how it came to be a movie was also very interesting to learn.
The most surprising aspect of reading this book was how funny it was. I am a sucker for clever dialogue and witty writing. Any book that makes me laugh out loud is a rare gem. This book had me laughing out loud and I tore through it at record speed. I highly recommend this "classic tale of true love and high adventure," and after you're done reading it, go watch the movie if you haven't already!
1 comments:
This is one of my favorite books of all time - Hilarious!
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