William Shakespeare’s Star Wars – Verily, A New Hope, by Ian Doescher

Ian Doescher decided there were more similarities than differences between the plots of Star Wars and most of the William Shakespeare’s plays. (Consider Hamlet with his father issues, and Luke and Darth Vader.) And because he loves Elizabethan literature, he wrote the Star Wars story in iambic pentameter, with the blessings of Lucasfilm, no less. You might think that would end up being a dreadful bore, but it’s not. It combines the beauty of the form of Elizabethan verse, its rhythm, formal structure and lyricism, with the comforting familiarity of the Star Wars plot and characters (and without the extended complicated metaphors employed by Shakespeare). (Continue reading…)