In my quest to read all of Shakespeare from start to finish, I finally made it to plays that I’d heard about and seen on the telly. I rubbed my hands in glee at what awaited me. Cover your eyes, I told Spock, it’s gonna be randy youngsters going all extra.

9. Romeo and Juliet

This turned out to be a version of The Sopranos meets The Godfather, with a bad case of teenage hormones thrown in to stir up more shit.

As for the leads: I’m aware that this is not a popular opinion, but as far as I could see, Romeo and Juliet were a pair of over-entitled, self-serving, horny little brats.

Ok, yes, they were both drop-dead gorgeous, so their instant attraction to one another was understandable. But she was an idiot, and he was one almighty drama queen. I wanted to smack their heads together most of the way through.

The reason we root for them is because this had more wondrously magical lines than all the plays I’d read so far put together. We want to believe lies that are so beautifully told.

Sadly, no one did anything remotely motivated by love in the entire play, and the only one who talked any sense at all was Friar Laurence. And no one was listening to him.

I did think killing them both off at the end, Tarantino style, was a bit over the top. Partly because of the seriously flawed logic. The idea that this would stop the families feuding was, frankly, ludicrous.

If all it took to start a massive, sword-wielding barney at the beginning of the play was some dude biting his thumb, then killing off the Godfather’s only heir was just gonna add fuel to the fire, surely?

But perhaps everyone just played nice in front of the Prince? And all the sorrow-filled peace-making was just a cover?

And if Will had got around to writing it, Romeo and Juliet 2 – Judgement Day, would have been explosive.

7/10 for being a joy to read.

10. A Midsummer Night’s Dream

This was great, unless you were a girl, in which case it was shit.

First, there’s Titania, the fairy Queen, who had a nasty practical joke played on her by her husband.

There’s also Helena, who nobody liked, for no good reason that I can see. Oh wait, she was quite clingy, self-pitying and whiney. But even so.

And then there’s Hermia. She was in love with Lysander, but her dad wanted her to marry Demetrius – because he liked him better.

There’s your double-X chromosome victims. So far, so predictable.

But to wind it up a bit, Hermia’s Dad dragged her off to see the Duke, who said, “how about it though – Demetrius seems like a nice enough fella? It’ll make your dad happy?”

I t did her no good at all to point out that Lysander was an all-round good egg too.

Because her dad replied – and get this, cos I’m not even joking – “she won’t do what I want, so can I kill her?”

Like WTF dad! That is NOT good parenting.

The only bloke that was the ‘butt’ of any joke was called Bottom (and, to be fair, we all saw that coming).
But his ‘punishment’ was to be treated like a God, and to spend the whole night in bed with Titania. Oh, the poor thing. Not.

Anyway, people had to run into the forest to avoid crazy-dad, and it was full of fairies, and weird plants with superpowers, and eventually everyone ended up in the right pairing. So, that’s cool.

But here Shakespeare completely outdid himself, with some of the most rapturously wonderful lines I’d ever heard. Just the rhythm of speaking them out loud was a treat.

Which is why (despite the dad from hell) I loved it.

Another solid 7/10

The question now was did our Will maintain the standards he’d set with these two front-runners? Or did it all descend into turgid misery again? Catch the next blog to find out.