Audiobooks

Through this week, I am consuming Hamlet in several different ways. 

Last week I read The Merchant of Venice while listening to an audiobook (and found a surprising number of editing mistakes). This week I have been consuming an audiobook of Hamlet, but I have been just listening to it. I simply soak it in and fully envelope myself in the characters and voice inflections of the audiobook. 

I really enjoy listening to audiobooks because of the deep character development you can get through voice inflections and emotions. I can easily distinguish between the characters and even imagine what they look like based on their personality. Usually audiobooks also give you background noise and music to introduce every scene. Most of the time the music helps set up the tone and foreshadow what is going to happen in the scene. I really enjoy this aspect of audiobooks because it helps me remember the placement of the scene. Several times I skim over or forget which setting I am supposed to be picturing when I read a play: the audiobook really helps me counter this. 

There are some audiobooks that explore inserting commentary into the text. 

I feel like inserting commentary into Shakespeare takes away the nature of the story. There is an organic growth that develops throughout stories and plays as the plot builds and climaxes. When you interrupt that growth to talk about things that are happening in the story/play the listener no longer gets the development of the story/play like the author intended. Shakespeare has difficult language and it is often difficult to understand, but there is value to just letting the audience enjoy the general story without commentary. 

I think commentary is not too invasive if you include it in the beginning or the end of the audiobook. That way it is like an introduction to the story and then a further wrap up/ discussion afterward. 

It would be interesting to explore a commentary audiobook version in one of Shakespeare's historical plays (like Henry V) instead of a comedy or tragedy (like Hamlet). Historical plays tend to be choppy and often have a narrator to guide you in the beginning of new scenes; therefore, a little commentary or analysis at that moment would not seem so inappropriate.