If you’re following Adam Begley on Twitter you already saw this, but today the Updike biographer tweeted his recently unearthed mini-review of Updike’s Gertrude and Claudius from Vol. 53, No. 14 (April 10, 2000) titled “Picks and Pans Review: Gertrude and Claudius”:

“It is winter in Denmark, in the soon-to-be-haunted castle of Elsinore, which, we are told, sits in a “foggy hinterland, where the sheep look like rocks and the rocks look like sheep.

“To Bleat or not to bleat? In this ingenious prequel to Shakespeare’s Hamlet, National Book Award winner John Updike dazzles with plenty of wordplay before the swordplay. Instead of fussing with a clever plot that dovetails with the Bard’s, Updike tells a simple love story and offers brilliantly nuanced portraits of two characters Shakespeare merely sketched—Queen Gertrude (Prince Hamlet’s mom) and King Claudius (Hamlet’s uncle turned wicked stepfather). This is a new perspective—that of a middle-aged queen falling for her husband’s darkly mysterious younger brother. Tragedy broods in the wings, of course. But for the space of this short, sly novel, the guilty couple share sweet romance. (Knopf, $23)

Bottom Line: Rich remaining of classic characters

Contributors: Paula Chin, Kim Hubbard, Adam Begley, Ralph Novak, Mike Neill, Kyle Smith, Debbie Seaman.