In his 17 November 1991 article for The New York Times, Peter Conrad observed “…the performance is also a revelation of Sir John himself: simultaneously noble and naughty, a high priest and a joker, contemplating at the end of a long life the value of the art he practices.”[2]
Aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports a 62% approval of Prospero's Books, with an average rating of 5.9/10 from 26 reviews and a critical consensus that reads: "There is no middle ground for viewers of Peter Greenaway's work, but for his fans, Prospero's Books is reliably daring."[6] Roger Ebert gave the work three stars out of four and argued, "Most of the reviews of this film have missed the point; this is not a narrative, it need not make sense, and it is not 'too difficult' because it could not have been any less so. It is simply a work of original art, which Greenaway asks us to accept or reject on his own terms."[7]
Box office
The film grossed £579,487 at the UK box office.[1] In the United States and Canada, where it was distributed by Miramax Films, it grossed $1.75 million (£1 million).[8]
