Anand’s Reviews > Shakespeare's Poems > Status Update

Venus and Adonis was a beautiful poem, but Lucrece, though a darker and more serious poem, is also a bit more engaging to me. (It seems many Elizabethan readers thought otherwise. Though both were read.)

“Venus and Adonis” is a beautiful poem, richly elaborate, “sweet” in its rich artificiality (this is the sweet Shakespeare that many Elizabethans loved). It’s not to every one’s taste, and it’s highly elaborated, and it can be a little bit rich to take. But it’s a beautiful Shakespearean work, worthy to be read by dedicated literature lovers and Shakespeareans.