> "Indeed, the irony today is that the Russians, the French and other people in foreign countries possess Shakespeare to a much greater extent than we do, for t

> "Indeed, the irony today is that the Russians, the French and other people in foreign countries possess Shakespeare to a much greater extent than we do, for the simple reason that unlike us, they get to enjoy Shakespeare in the language they speak." This reminds me of a popular anecdote in philosophy, that German students grapping with Kant's Critique of Pure Reason often prefer Norman Kemp Smith's English translation over trying to deciper Kant's 18th-century German :) That said, I'd argue that literary work (especially literary work with such linguistic significance) should be handled differently than theoretical/expository work. What modern students really need are not so much translations [1] as meticulously annotated editions where the annotations are (so to speak) written by linguists rather than literature professors (i.e. the focus should be on bridging the language gap & providing linguistic context, not on literary interpretation or tediously over-analyzing literary symbolism) [1] which would be as exciting to read compared to the original as a remake of Gone with the Wind in the 21st century - the plot is there, but the magic is lost.