books_of_salma's review against another edition
4.0
Veel beter dan Beatrijs. De abstracte begrippen als personages waren interessant en een duidelijke boodschap en rol van God.
msand3's review
2.0
These mystery and morality plays are exactly as expected: simple, direct, predictable, and didactic. They were the movies of their day, designed for mass appeal and easy to be performed across the land. Noah's Flood tells the story of...Noah's flood, with a little low brow "shrewish wife" humor to keep the viewers interested, I guess. The Second Shepherds' Play is a comic pastoral tale of a con man and his wife stealing a ram, which was obviously meant as an attention-grabber for the final scene tacked on at the end, which is the birth of Jesus. This is made all the more out-of-place considering the shepherds were using "Christ" in their cursing throughout the play: ""Christ's curse, you lazy swine!", "Christ bless me", etc. Either this was sly humor, or no one cared that the shepherds were using Christ's name in vain before he was even born!
Everyman is perhaps the most influential allegory in English before Pilgrim's Progress (and obviously influenced Bunyan's text). I also found it rather dull. I often wonder if texts like this are classic merely because they happened to survive. If we had hundreds of such plays, would these stand out, or would they just be run-of-the-mill? And if these survived precisely because they stood out and were "the best of the best," then I'd have to question whether or not mystery plays and morality plays are worth reading today, beyond their obvious historical and theological value. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I found these plays didn't speak to me as a modern reader. And that's pretty rare. I find so many medieval texts, and even ancient texts, remain fresh and relevant. They still have something important to show us in the 21st century. I didn't get that sense from these plays at all.
Everyman is perhaps the most influential allegory in English before Pilgrim's Progress (and obviously influenced Bunyan's text). I also found it rather dull. I often wonder if texts like this are classic merely because they happened to survive. If we had hundreds of such plays, would these stand out, or would they just be run-of-the-mill? And if these survived precisely because they stood out and were "the best of the best," then I'd have to question whether or not mystery plays and morality plays are worth reading today, beyond their obvious historical and theological value. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I found these plays didn't speak to me as a modern reader. And that's pretty rare. I find so many medieval texts, and even ancient texts, remain fresh and relevant. They still have something important to show us in the 21st century. I didn't get that sense from these plays at all.
fino's review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
oblomov's review
4.0
Reviewed as part of the [b: Everyman and Other Medieval Miracle and Morality Plays|6577154|Everyman and Other Medieval Miracle and Morality Plays|Anonymous|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1347502129l/6577154._SY75_.jpg|437823] collection here.
More...