This may be Margaret Atwood’s greatest masterpiece. In Hag-Seed, she retells Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” by turning it inside-out and adding a layer. It’s a play within a play within a novel. This restructuring results in a hybrid form of story-telling that’s actually very funny. In her version, prisoners discuss “The Tempest” while staging it as part of a literacy class taught by a visiting director with ulterior motives. The criminals candidly discuss murder and revenge from a professional perspective. This is a laugh-out-loud book for readers with all levels of acquaintance with this classic play.
Margaret Atwood, Hag-Seed. (London: Hogarth Shakespeare, 2016″), 10.