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3.78 AVERAGE
3.78 AVERAGE
A fascinating look at what little we actually know about William Shakespeare.
I just love Bill Bryson.
This book might have a feeling of commissioned piece written specifically for this series ("Eminent lives") but I don't care - I could just read Bryson anytime, anywhere and he always cheers me up. Sure, lacking anything concrete to write about Shakespeare, he goes on about living descriptions of Tudor's London and its fine by me - I find it fascinating. He decidedly avoids making up any stories about Shakespeare and keeps kind of cool head about subject that has been so generously imagined and re-imagined trough centuries. Best of all is how in just a few strokes Bryson waves off all the theories of somebody else being "real Shakespeare" - instead of being nasty, he laughs it off, makes fun of it and simultaneously embarrassed me for ever even thinking about it.
This book might have a feeling of commissioned piece written specifically for this series ("Eminent lives") but I don't care - I could just read Bryson anytime, anywhere and he always cheers me up. Sure, lacking anything concrete to write about Shakespeare, he goes on about living descriptions of Tudor's London and its fine by me - I find it fascinating. He decidedly avoids making up any stories about Shakespeare and keeps kind of cool head about subject that has been so generously imagined and re-imagined trough centuries. Best of all is how in just a few strokes Bryson waves off all the theories of somebody else being "real Shakespeare" - instead of being nasty, he laughs it off, makes fun of it and simultaneously embarrassed me for ever even thinking about it.
funny
informative
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
Sometimes all you need is a fresh look at an old bard. In Bryson style a great deal of information is distilled and presented in an accessible manner. Of course the audio with him as narrator is a must!
Entertaining wander through Shakespeare and his oeuvre - can I use that word? ;)
The incomparable Bryson turns his attention to the hard and provides a scholarly yet very readable summary of exactly what we really know of the man and his life. Which regrettably is nowhere near enough, of course, but this helping of history will at least whet your appetite.
If I were the guy that travelled back in time and wrote Shakespeare’s plays (and I’m not allowed to admit that I am that guy), I’d be rather miffed at Bill Bryson’s casual, almost flippant, conclusion that there’s no shadowy organization or person who supplied Shakespeare (if that is even his real name) with his texts, except that it results in a most excellent concluding sentence to this book. That final sentence is such a pithy summary that I almost wish I had never even met Will in the first place.
But about the book: I am a huge fan of Shakespeare and read a lot of things that he has written (though not really anything he wrote recently) and I also peruse the occasional biography or autobiography of his that I come across, so I feel like I’m very qualified to answer many trivia questions about him, his life, and his times. This book by Bill Bryson really increased my Shakespeare trivia store significantly, and not just in trivially detailed ways: I get a really good picture of what we know (and don’t know) about Shakespeare, how we learned these things, and even much about the people who did the research to uncover the bits we know. Furthermore, the text itself is fun to read. My reading is probably 25% non-fiction/75% fiction, so I’m neither new to nonfiction nor innocent of the charms of fiction, so I feel qualified to point to this work and say “Good… well done,” without ever needing to refer to my historically published works that, alas, I can never claim as my own.
But about the book: I am a huge fan of Shakespeare and read a lot of things that he has written (though not really anything he wrote recently) and I also peruse the occasional biography or autobiography of his that I come across, so I feel like I’m very qualified to answer many trivia questions about him, his life, and his times. This book by Bill Bryson really increased my Shakespeare trivia store significantly, and not just in trivially detailed ways: I get a really good picture of what we know (and don’t know) about Shakespeare, how we learned these things, and even much about the people who did the research to uncover the bits we know. Furthermore, the text itself is fun to read. My reading is probably 25% non-fiction/75% fiction, so I’m neither new to nonfiction nor innocent of the charms of fiction, so I feel qualified to point to this work and say “Good… well done,” without ever needing to refer to my historically published works that, alas, I can never claim as my own.
Bryson had a tough job writing a bio with little real factual information about Shakespeare from that time. He sticks closely to real verifiable documents. Book is a good historical fiction read coz Bryson explores the life and events around Shakespeare also.
This is an excellent short book about Shakespeare, or rather explaining what we don’t know and why. It strips away conjecture, speculation and myth and goes to the bare bones of how the false, or at least mistaken, ideas have arisen. I found it incredibly helpful as I am about to embark on a Shakespeare odyssey in the new year.
At the end of this book, we still won't learn a lot about Shakespear, but then even there not that many information on him. Still this book still manage to cover a lot about london, the theater scene etc. Very good book