William Shakespeare's Star Wars

By: Ian Doescher

Narrated by: Daniel Davis, Jonathan Davis, Ian Doescher, January LaVoy, Marc Thompson

Audie Award Finalist, Multi-Voiced Performance, 2014

Return once more to a galaxy far, far away with this sublime retelling of George Lucas's epic Star Wars in the style of the immortal Bard of Avon. The saga of a wise (Jedi) knight and an evil (Sith) lord, of a beautiful princess held captive and a young hero coming of age, Star Wars abounds with all the valor and villainy of Shakespeare's greatest plays. 'Tis a tale told by fretful droids, full of faithful Wookiees and fearsome Stormtroopers, signifying...pretty much everything.

William Shakespeare's Star Wars will astound and edify Rebels and Imperials alike. Zounds! This is the audiobook you're looking for.

©2013 Ian Doescher (P)2013 Random House Audio

Wonderful!

I wasn't sure what do expect. Star Wars is Shakespearean and loved all iambic pentameter and Shakespeare insults. Loved it. Can't wait ti listen again with the kids.

So enjoyable!

After being involved with a theatre production recently, I had developed a major curiosity for checking out these Shakespearean renditions of the Classic Star Wars trilogy. Plus some of my favorite audiobook narrators all take part in bringing these interesting versions of these characters to life, and add so much to a delightful listen! Marc Thompson As C3P0 might’ve been my favorite.

Great fun

I enjoyed listening to the book. Great acting and sound effects brought new life to a well beloved story for me.

Hilarious and awesome!

A great performance of one of the Bard's true classics. The acting was at times a bit wooden, but true Star Wars fans will recognize the in-jokes from the multiple iterations of the original trilogy. Can't wait for the next one!

Wow

I expected a goofy parody but no, this is actual genius the way that Doescher mends the two styles. Great read

Star Wars fans should listen to this.

What did you love best about William Shakespeare's Star Wars?

Everything.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Princess Leila Skywalker

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

No I did not.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Both the narrators were fantastic.

Any additional comments?

Will there be a book 7?

Amazing.

Great voice acting. Great twist on two classics. I can't wait for the next one.

Super Fun

Where does William Shakespeare's Star Wars rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This is easily the funnest audio book I've had the pleasure of listening to thus far.

Who was your favorite character and why?

As far as this novel goes, right now I'm caught between C-3PO and Han Solo. C-3PO is already a very dramatic character and hearing his narrative in William Shakespeare's Star Wars made me laugh aloud. Han Solo's stubbornness was also magnified by the narrative's style and made me love the character more.

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

The multiple narrators here were absolutely perfect. I was particularly happy about Daniel Davis being one of them. As far as I could tell, he read the chorus and did a fantastic job.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

There's already a film for this book so I'll just ignore this question...

OMG this is fun!

If you've seen the movie more than a few times you will have a great time listening to this. Yeah it's short but worth it.

Bloody Brilliant!

As a huge fan of both Shakespeare and SW, this review is admittedly biased, I first came across this at Comic Con, bought all three and later the audios here, and listened to this in one sitting while working at my computer. The writing by Ian Doescher is brilliant, flowing naturally and seamlessly from the Poet's point of view, and it's obvious the author enjoyed writing it. I recognized parts where A Midsummer Night's Dream, MacBeth, Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Romeo and Juliet, and many others were used as inspiration. I loved how each character is given soliloquies, often from just a single line in the movie. It's easy to understand and follow while multi-tasking (and in fact I think I understand the original plays better than before too!)
Voice acting is excellent, and engineering is well done. The sound effects are balanced and ne'er o'er shadow the narration but compliment it.
The only thing I didn't entirely like was that some of R2-D2's lines are literally written out as "Beep, whistle, squeak..."etc., whereas I would much rather have the sound effect beeping from the movie. However this too is by design, as his lines are ALSO in iambic pentameter!