Shakespeare Saved My Life: Ten Years in Solitary With the Bard
Written by Laura Bates
Narrated by Cassandra Campbell
4/5
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About this audiobook
Thus begins the most unlikely of friendships, one bonded by Shakespeare and lasting years-a friendship that, in the end, would save more than one life.
Laura Bates
Laura Bates is a Sunday Times bestselling author and the founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, a collection of over 200,000 testimonies of gender inequality. Her non-fiction books include Everyday Sexism, Girl Up, Misogynation, Men Who Hate Women and Fix the System, Not the Women. She writes regularly for The Guardian and the Telegraph, among other publications, and won a British Press Award in 2015. Laura works closely with organisations from the Council of Europe to the United Nations to tackle gender inequality. She was awarded a British Empire Medal for services to gender equality and has been named a woman of the year by Cosmopolitan, Red and The Sunday Times.
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Men Who Hate Women: From Incels to Pickup Artists: The Truth About Extreme Misogyny and How It Affects Us All Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Girl Up: Kick Ass, Claim Your Woman Card, and Crush Everyday Sexism Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
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Reviews for Shakespeare Saved My Life
110 ratings13 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Being a retired high school English teacher and one who has taught Shakespeare for decades, I’m always on the lookout for books about the teaching of the bard’s works. I began this book several months ago reading the print version. I ended up putting it down after a few chapters. (probably because something I had been waiting for for months came back to the library). Then I started listening to books while I walked on the treadmill, so I went back to Laura Bates’ book as an audio book. While I find her prison Shakespeare program laudable, and I have the utmost admiration for what she did, I really felt that her tone was so sympathetic to the offenders, and she spent very little time talking about their victims. I know this book is about the offenders and what they accomplished using Shakespeare as a vehicle. That said, Bates seems to cast inmate Larry Newton, the focus of the story, mostly as a victim himself. I admired his achievements both in learning Shakespeare and in preparing materials to teach Shakespeare. However, the bottom line is he is a killer, and his sentence is fully justified. Bates spends some time seemingly criticizing Indiana law regarding murder, namely that anyone involved in the murder of a victim is charged with the same crime as the person who did the actual killing. While admittedly harsh, it is a law that has been in place long enough that it is well known. Larry Newton will never be released from prison, and he probably shouldn’t be released. That doesn’t mean, however, that he can’t do a lot of good while behind bars as he has already shown. Laura Bates’ “Shakespeare Saved My Life” is well worth the time investment, and the audio version is read by a narrator whose voice is pleasant.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Extraordinary. Inspiring. Heartbreaking. I loved it!
A gem! 2 thumbs up. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Being a retired high school English teacher and one who has taught Shakespeare for decades, I’m always on the lookout for books about the teaching of the bard’s works. I began this book several months ago reading the print version. I ended up putting it down after a few chapters. (probably because something I had been waiting for for months came back to the library). Then I started listening to books while I walked on the treadmill, so I went back to Laura Bates’ book as an audio book. While I find her prison Shakespeare program laudable, and I have the utmost admiration for what she did, I really felt that her tone was so sympathetic to the offenders, and she spent very little time talking about their victims. I know this book is about the offenders and what they accomplished using Shakespeare as a vehicle. That said, Bates seems to cast inmate Larry Newton, the focus of the story, mostly as a victim himself. I admired his achievements both in learning Shakespeare and in preparing materials to teach Shakespeare. However, the bottom line is he is a killer, and his sentence is fully justified. Bates spends some time seemingly criticizing Indiana law regarding murder, namely that anyone involved in the murder of a victim is charged with the same crime as the person who did the actual killing. While admittedly harsh, it is a law that has been in place long enough that it is well known. Larry Newton will never be released from prison, and he probably shouldn’t be released. That doesn’t mean, however, that he can’t do a lot of good while behind bars as he has already shown. Laura Bates’ “Shakespeare Saved My Life” is well worth the time investment, and the audio version is read by a narrator whose voice is pleasant.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A nonfiction account of a college professor who teaches a Shakespeare class at a maximum-security prison in Indiana. The results are life-changing for some of the inmates. I loved the prisoners' interpretation of many of the Bard's plays. Their unique perspectives gave added depth to many plays, especially Macbeth and the histories.“Why is a prisoner’s motivation to earn a degree so that he can return to his family sooner viewed more negatively than a campus student’s motivation to earn a degree so he can make more money?”“Hoffman: “Ultimately, here’s the question Macbeth needs to face, and it’s the question we all need to face: What does it profit a man if he gains the world but loses his soul? Seriously. You gain everything but you lose your humanity. This is what happens to Macbeth. And that’s what happens to us, out of the choices we make.”“A record ten and a half consecutive years in solitary confinement, and he’s not crazy, he’s not dangerous—he’s reading Shakespeare.”
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I’ve never wanted to read Shakespeare in my life, but I think Larry and Dr. Bates have changed my mind.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The most interesting parts of this book are not the author's to tell. This was not her story. The parts that could/should have been her story aren't very insightful/reflective except for some shallow, perfunctory notes. Either talk more about the program, the must-have-been dozens of inmates in her program, or get Newton to write his own memoir. He wrote pages upon pages of Shakespeare workbooks, I'm sure he would have managed a memoir.
But even with all that focus on the guy, we don't even get a note about where he is today, how he's doing, how he reacted to the cancellation of the program... - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Things I liked:
Very objective reporting of the events, crimes and actions that take place in the prison
Minimal offensive language (only used when directly quoting someone)
The crimes discussed are not gone into in great detail, no graphic descriptions of violence because that's not the point of the book. Murder is horrible no matter what but the point is that education and learning how to think in a critical way about complex issues can change the lives of people who otherwise were considered irredeemable.
I read a couple reviews where others thought the author was self-congratulatory but she didn't come across that way to me. Rather I felt that she sounded a bit surprised that she was able to affect lives in what was originally just an idea she had to help achieve tenure but she is more effusive about the positive effects that Larry (the prisoner the title refers too) has had in teaching fellow prisoners and at risk tooth and his illuminating understanding of Shakespeare's works. For example, she says, referring to one "workbook" he wrote (and he wrote many), "At sixty thousand words, Larry's workbook was longer than my PhD dissertation. And in one important respect, it was also better." She goes on to praise his original thinking, which throughout the book she points out as being more insightful than most professional scholars.
And all this for a book I thought I'd just read a chapter of before bed and now it's 4 AM... - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Even though this book was really disorganized and jumped around, I really thoroughly enjoyed it. It wasn't so much a memoir, as much as it was a story about a maximum security inmate whose life changed by attending a Shakespeare program in prison. Laura Bates, a college professor, started going to a maximum security facility in Indiana and teaching Shakespeare to inmates in solitary. She discovered that they responded really well to reading and analyzing the Bards work. One inmate in particular, Larry Newton, provided insight and analysis that was almost better than top scholars in the field. With no access to spark notes, foot notes, or scholarly opinions, he started formulating his own. He had nothing but time on his hands and really dug deep into the meanings behind everything, and this is from a killer who never completed middle school. Through her work with the inmates and their eagerness and excitement to learn, both parties end up changing for the better. A feel good read that makes you think twice about felons capacity for change.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shakespeare Saved My Life: Ten Years in Solitary with the Bard is a heart wrenching story. I so wanted that lifer to be free. That man grew so much under the tutelage of Professor Bates. This book is definitely worth a detour. It will touch you heart and make you question if there should be life sentences.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This book is written by a professor who teaches Shakespeare to prisoners. It especially focuses on one prisoner who spent many years in solitary confinement, and was violent and suicidal until he started reading and analyzing Shakespeare and using the plays as a tool to process his own life.
The prisoner the book focuses on is incredibly intelligent and I was very impressed by his analysis of Shakespeare. The professor's work in prisons is admirable. I just really didn't like the way the book was written. The tone was a bit too conversational. I couldn't remember the stories of a lot of the plays they talked about, so it made the insights less potent. Also, I am ashamed to admit, I have never been a big Shakespeare fan. (Sorry Mom and Kim.) - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book is about Laura Bates and her star pupil, Larry Newton. Bates is a professor of English, specializing in Shakespeare and Newton is a lifer in an Indiana prison. Bates uses Shakespeare's plays MacBeth, Hamlet and RicHard2 to help her prison students examine their lives in prison in relation to the Shakespearean texts. It is quite a revelation to discover that the words, although 400 years old, can still apply to a modern setting, in particular a prison. Newton is one of these guys who never finished high school,but who is obviously very intelligent, articulate and an excellent word smith. Newton goes through a lot of self discovery, including the realization that prison is both physical and psychological and if one can break out of the latter, then one can do wonders. He exhibits tremendous leadership and analytical skills which allow him to become a minor celebrity and also a writer of the introductions to the plays which will be studied by the prison population and youth at risk.I enjoyed the book and would have given it more stars if the chapters had not been so short . It is a positive look at what can be accomplished when one finds the right stimulus.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Excellent, easy read on a challenging difficult topic. Will make you laugh, maybe cry, and certainly think. Highly recommend.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dr. Laura Bates, professor of English at Indiana State University, once thought prisoners in long-term solitary confinement were beyond rehabilitation. She thought education in prisons should focus on first-time offenders, those more likely to return to society and change their ways as a result of what they'd learned. That all changed when she finally succeeded in opening the doors to the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility's Solitary Housing Unit (SHU), where she came face to face with some of the most dangerous of inmates and determined to teach them Shakespeare.Bates went into SHU not knowing what to expect, and emerged with an unlikely group of Shakespeare scholars with a decidedly unique perspective, not the least of which is Larry Newton, a convicted murderer serving out a life sentence whose several escape attempts keep him from even joining the group that Bates was able to convene in SHU. Bates quickly realizes Newton's gift for unpacking Shakespeare's meaning and taps his thoughts to produce workbooks for other prisoners and even her university students. This work is life-altering for both Newton and the many students whose Shakespeare discussions cause them to look at their lives and their incarceration with new eyes.I have mixed feelings about Shakespeare Saved My Life. Considering the fact that it is a book about the remarkable insights even a very uneducated prisoner can bring to Shakespeare, its style seemed almost patronizing to me, as it might to its other non-incarcerated, more educated readers. The chapters are very short, and the writing style is very uncomplicated. There's a bit too much telling mixed in with the showing. Telling me outright why education is valuable to and should be given to prisoners is not necessary if you do a good job of showing me, which Bates certainly does. Likewise, Bates need not go on explicitly extolling what an insightful Shakespeare scholar Larry Newton is when she's already done a fine job of revealing through his speech and his writing how very able he is to decode Shakespeare and introduce the Bard to his fellow inmates. Bates seems to push a little too hard, and at times, the belaboring of her points felt condescending, which is bizarrely incongruous with a woman who so successfully brought Shakespeare into what should have been a very hostile environment. Despite my confusion over the writing style, I found the content of Bates' memoir to be fascinating. I struggled with Shakespeare through high school, and even after college struggled to draw meaning from Hamlet without the help of a commentary. Even now I hesitate to wade any further into Shakespeare's work because I fear that so much of its meaning would elude me, and I doubt my feelings are unique among a good percentage of the population. This makes it that much more impressive that not only did Bates find a collection of willing students in supermax, but she also found a group who actively engaged with Shakespeare's work and discovered that much of its meaning could relate to their lives. Bates' experiences are a powerful testament as to why education should be available in prison, despite many arguments against it, some of which were yet echoing in my mind even as they were about to be ably disproved. As Shakespeare's work speaks to prisoners who are supposed to be beyond rehabilitation, Bates shows that their lives are changed, and so, to her surprise, is her own.