Promotional Information

This is the fullest and most brilliant account ever written of Shakespeare's life, his work and his age.

About the Author

Stephen Greenblatt is the John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University and is the founder of the school of literary criticism known as New Historicism. As visiting professor and lecturer at universities in England, Australia, the United States and elsewhere throughout the world, he has delivered such distinguished series of lectures as the Clarendon Lectures at Oxford and the University Public Lectures at Princeton. He has received two Guggenheim Fellowships and has been President of the Modern Language Association. Professor Greenblatt is the author and co-author of nine books and the editor of ten others, including The Norton Anthology of English Literature (7th edition) and The Norton Shakespeare.

Reviews

"A vast shelf of biographies of the Bard exists, but this is the book I would take with me to a desert island"
*Guardian*

"A work of wonderful erudition that can be read as an accessible introduction to the social and political milieu from which Shakespeare emerged, and as an elegant guide to the astonishing poems and plays themselves"
*New Statesman*

"Both insightful literary criticism and a gripping piece of psychological detective work … Stephen Greenblatt has few equals as a Shakespeare scholar"
*Metro*

"A delight, full of new insights and infused with a rich understanding of precisely why Shakespeare’s writing gives us such lasting pleasure … quite superb"
*Sunday Times 'Books of the Year'*

"Thought-provoking … full of unexpected touches … beautifully written"
*Daily Telegraph*

This much-awaited new biography of the elusive Bard is brilliant in conception, often superb in execution, but sometimes-perhaps inevitably-disappointing in its degree of speculativeness. Bardolators may take this last for granted, but curious lay readers seeking a fully cohesive and convincing life may at times feel the accumulation of "may haves," "might haves" and "could haves" make it difficult to suspend disbelief. Greenblatt's espousing, for instance, of the theory that Shakespeare's "lost" years before arriving in London were spent in Lancashire leads to suppositions that he might have met the Catholic subversive Edmund Campion, and how that might have affected him-and it all rests on one factoid: the bequeathing by a nobleman of some player's items to a William Shakeshafte, who may, plausibly, have been the young Shakespeare. Nevertheless, Norton Shakespeare general editor and New Historicist Greenblatt succeed impressively in locating the man in both his greatest works and the turbulent world in which he lived. With a blend of biography, literary interpretation and history, Greenblatt persuasively analyzes William's father's rise and fall as a public figure in Stratford, which pulled him in both Protestant and Catholic directions and made his eldest son "a master of double consciousness." In a virtuoso display of historical and literary criticism, Greenblatt contrasts Christopher Marlowe's Jew of Malta, Elizabeth's unfortunate Sephardic physician-who was executed for conspiracy-and Shakespeare's ambiguous villain Shylock. This wonderful study, built on a lifetime's scholarship and a profound ability to perceive the life within the texts, creates as vivid and full portrait of Shakespeare as we are likely ever to have. 16 pages color illus. not seen by PW. Agent, Jill Kneerim. (Sept.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

"A vast shelf of biographies of the Bard exists, but this is the book I would take with me to a desert island" -- Jay Parini * Guardian *
"A work of wonderful erudition that can be read as an accessible introduction to the social and political milieu from which Shakespeare emerged, and as an elegant guide to the astonishing poems and plays themselves" * New Statesman *
"Both insightful literary criticism and a gripping piece of psychological detective work ... Stephen Greenblatt has few equals as a Shakespeare scholar" * Metro *
"A delight, full of new insights and infused with a rich understanding of precisely why Shakespeare's writing gives us such lasting pleasure ... quite superb" -- John Simpson * Sunday Times 'Books of the Year' *
"Thought-provoking ... full of unexpected touches ... beautifully written" -- Andrew Marr * Daily Telegraph *