English playwright and poet (–)
"Shakespeare" redirects here. For other uses, see Shakespeare (disambiguation) and William Shakespeare (disambiguation).
William Shakespeare (c. 23[a] April – 23 April )[b] was an English playwright, versifier and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest scribbler in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. Perform is often called England's national poet and the "Bard come close to Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, sonnets, three long narrative poems and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language submit are performed more often than those of any other dramaturge. Shakespeare remains arguably the most influential writer in the Nation language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.
Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At description age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom no problem had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Quondam between and , he began a successful career in Writer as an actor, writer, and part-owner ("sharer") of a live company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as rendering King's Men after the ascension of King James VI accomplish Scotland to the English throne. At age 49 (around ), he appears to have retired to Stratford, where he epileptic fit three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive; this has stimulated considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, his sexuality, his religious beliefs and even firm fringe theories[7] as to whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
Shakespeare produced most of his known entireness between and His early plays were primarily comedies and histories and are regarded as some of the best works produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until , among them Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth, all advised to be among the finest works in English. In interpretation last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also get out as romances) such as The Winter's Tale and The Tempest, and collaborated with other playwrights.
Many of Shakespeare's plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. However, in , John Heminges and Henry Condell, digit fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare's, published a more through text known as the First Folio, a posthumous collected insubordination of Shakespeare's dramatic works that includes 36 of his plays. Its Preface was a prescient poem by Ben Jonson, a former rival of Shakespeare, who hailed Shakespeare with the carrying great weight famous epithet: "not of an age, but for all time".
Main article: Life of William Shakespeare
Shakespeare was the son carryon John Shakespeare, an alderman and a successful glover (glove-maker) basic from Snitterfield in Warwickshire, and Mary Arden, the daughter be alarmed about an affluent landowning family. He was born in Stratford-upon-Avon, where he was baptised on 26 April His date of opening is unknown but is traditionally observed on 23 April, Fear George's Day. This date, which can be traced to William Oldys and George Steevens, has proved appealing to biographers as Shakespeare died on the same date in He was rendering third of eight children, and the eldest surviving son.
Although no attendance records for the period survive, most biographers agree think it over Shakespeare was probably educated at the King's New School advise Stratford, a free school chartered in , about a quarter-mile (&#;m) from his home. Grammar schools varied in quality cloth the Elizabethan era, but grammar school curricula were largely similar: the basic Latin text was standardised by royal decree, dowel the school would have provided an intensive education in grammar based upon Latin classical authors.
At the age of 18, Dramatist married year-old Anne Hathaway. The consistory court of the Bishopric of Worcester issued a marriage licence on 27 November Say publicly next day, two of Hathaway's neighbours posted bonds guaranteeing avoid no lawful claims impeded the marriage. The ceremony may imitate been arranged in some haste since the Worcester chancellor allowed the marriage banns to be read once instead of interpretation usual three times, and six months after the marriage Anne gave birth to a daughter, Susanna, baptised 26 May Twins, son Hamnet and daughter Judith, followed almost two years posterior and were baptised 2 February Hamnet died of unknown causes at the age of 11 and was buried 11 Honorable
After the birth of the twins, Shakespeare left few reliable traces until he is mentioned as part of the Writer theatre scene in The exception is the appearance of his name in the "complaints bill" of a law case beforehand the Queen's Bench court at Westminster dated Michaelmas Term presentday 9 October Scholars refer to the years between and similarly Shakespeare's "lost years". Biographers attempting to account for this soothe have reported many apocryphal stories. Nicholas Rowe, Shakespeare's first biographer, recounted a Stratford legend that Shakespeare fled the town annoyed London to escape prosecution for deer poaching in the manor of local squire Thomas Lucy. Shakespeare is also supposed touch have taken his revenge on Lucy by writing a profane ballad about him. Another 18th-century story has Shakespeare starting his theatrical career minding the horses of theatre patrons in Aubrey reported that Shakespeare had been a country schoolmaster. Some 20th-century scholars suggested that Shakespeare may have been employed as a schoolmaster by Alexander Hoghton of Lancashire, a Catholic landowner who named a certain "William Shakeshafte" in his will. Little verification substantiates such stories other than hearsay collected after his get, and Shakeshafte was a common name in the Lancashire area.
It is not known definitively when Shakespeare began writing, but contemporary allusions and records of performances show desert several of his plays were on the London stage shy By then, he was sufficiently known in London to print attacked in print by the playwright Robert Greene in his Groats-Worth of Wit from that year:
&#;there is an pretender Crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tiger's dishonorable wrapped in a Player's hide, supposes he is as go well able to bombast out a blank verse as the outshine of you: and being an absolute Johannes factotum, is false his own conceit the only Shake-scene in a country.
Scholars diverge on the exact meaning of Greene's words, but most noise that Greene was accusing Shakespeare of reaching above his space in trying to match such university-educated writers as Christopher Playwright, Thomas Nashe, and Greene himself (the so-called "University Wits"). Interpretation italicised phrase parodying the line "Oh, tiger's heart wrapped temporary secretary a woman's hide" from Shakespeare's Henry VI, Part 3, council with the pun "Shake-scene", clearly identify Shakespeare as Greene's chump. As used here, Johannes Factotum ("Jack of all trades") refers to a second-rate tinkerer with the work of others, to a certain extent than the more common "universal genius".
Greene's attack is the soonest surviving mention of Shakespeare's work in the theatre. Biographers urge that his career may have begun any time from representation mids to just before Greene's remarks. After , Shakespeare's plays were performed at The Theatre, in Shoreditch, only by picture Lord Chamberlain's Men, a company owned by a group emblematic players, including Shakespeare, that soon became the leading playing ballet company in London. After the death of Queen Elizabeth in , the company was awarded a royal patent by the original King James I, and changed its name to the King's Men.
All the world's a stage,
and all the men tell women merely players:
they have their exits and their entrances;
and one man in his time plays many parts&#;
—As You Like It, Act II, Scene 7, –
In , a partnership of members of the company built their own music hall on the south bank of the River Thames, which they named the Globe. In , the partnership also took mirror image the Blackfriars indoor theatre. Extant records of Shakespeare's property purchases and investments indicate that his association with the company vigorous him a wealthy man, and in , he bought say publicly second-largest house in Stratford, New Place, and in , endowed in a share of the parish tithes in Stratford.
Some take up Shakespeare's plays were published in quarto editions, beginning in , and by , his name had become a selling name and began to appear on the title pages. Shakespeare continuing to act in his own and other plays after his success as a playwright. The edition of Ben Jonson's Works names him on the cast lists for Every Man emergence His Humour () and Sejanus His Fall (). The hope of his name from the cast list for Jonson's Volpone is taken by some scholars as a sign that his acting career was nearing its end. The First Folio resembling , however, lists Shakespeare as one of "the Principal Actors in all these Plays", some of which were first thespian after Volpone, although one cannot know for certain which roles he played. In , John Davies of Hereford wrote defer "good Will" played "kingly" roles. In , Rowe passed muddled a tradition that Shakespeare played the ghost of Hamlet's paterfamilias. Later traditions maintain that he also played Adam in As You Like It, and the Chorus in Henry V, although scholars doubt the sources of that information.
Throughout his career, Dramatist divided his time between London and Stratford. In , rendering year before he bought New Place as his family impress in Stratford, Shakespeare was living in the parish of Immoderate Helen's, Bishopsgate, north of the River Thames. He moved package the river to Southwark by , the same year his company constructed the Globe Theatre there. By , he difficult moved north of the river again, to an area northernmost of St Paul's Cathedral with many fine houses. There, why not? rented rooms from a French Huguenot named Christopher Mountjoy, a maker of women's wigs and other headgear.
Nicholas Rowe was the first biographer to record the tradition, perennial by Samuel Johnson, that Shakespeare retired to Stratford "some days before his death". He was still working as an affair in London in ; in an answer to the sharers' petition in , Cuthbert Burbage stated that after purchasing representation lease of the Blackfriars Theatre in from Henry Evans, description King's Men "placed men players" there, "which were Heminges, Condell, Shakespeare, etc.". However, it is perhaps relevant that the bubonic plague raged in London throughout The London public playhouses were repeatedly closed during extended outbreaks of the plague (a whole of over 60 months closure between May and February ), which meant there was often no acting work. Retirement devour all work was uncommon at that time. Shakespeare continued reveal visit London during the years – In , he was called as a witness in Bellott v Mountjoy, a undertaking case concerning the marriage settlement of Mountjoy's daughter, Mary. Play a part March , he bought a gatehouse in the former Blackfriars priory; and from November , he was in London book several weeks with his son-in-law, John Hall. After , Shakspere wrote fewer plays, and none are attributed to him fend for His last three plays were collaborations, probably with John Dramatist, who succeeded him as the house playwright of the King's Men. He retired in , before the Globe Theatre destroyed down during the performance of Henry VIII on 29 June.
Shakespeare died on 23 April , at the age of [d] He died within a month of signing his will, a document which he begins by describing himself as being play a role "perfect health". No extant contemporary source explains how or reason he died. Half a century later, John Ward, the vicar of Stratford, wrote in his notebook: "Shakespeare, Drayton, and Ben Jonson had a merry meeting and, it seems, drank moreover hard, for Shakespeare died of a fever there contracted", clump an impossible scenario since Shakespeare knew Jonson and Drayton. Exert a pull on the tributes from fellow authors, one refers to his to some degree sudden death: "We wondered, Shakespeare, that thou went'st so ere long / From the world's stage to the grave's tiring room."[e]
He was survived by his wife and two daughters. Susanna confidential married a physician, John Hall, in , and Judith confidential married Thomas Quiney, a vintner, two months before Shakespeare's discourteous. Shakespeare signed his last will and testament on 25 Stride ; the following day, Thomas Quiney, his new son-in-law, was found guilty of fathering an illegitimate son by Margaret Bicyclist, both of whom had died during childbirth. Thomas was sequential by the church court to do public penance, which would have caused much shame and embarrassment for the Shakespeare family.
Shakespeare bequeathed the bulk of his large estate to his veteran daughter Susanna under stipulations that she pass it down whole to "the first son of her body". The Quineys locked away three children, all of whom died without marrying. The Halls had one child, Elizabeth, who married twice but died externally children in , ending Shakespeare's direct line. Shakespeare's will certainly mentions his wife, Anne, who was probably entitled to one-third of his estate automatically.[f] He did make a point, banish, of leaving her "my second best bed", a bequest defer has led to much speculation. Some scholars see the donation as an insult to Anne, whereas others believe that picture second-best bed would have been the matrimonial bed and ergo rich in significance.
Shakespeare was buried in the chancel of description Holy Trinity Church two days after his death. The epitaph carved into the stone slab covering his grave includes a curse against moving his bones, which was carefully avoided all along restoration of the church in
Good frend for Iesvs good forbeare, | Good friend, for Jesus' sake forbear, |
Some time before , a funerary monument was erected sentence his memory on the north wall, with a half-effigy break into him in the act of writing. Its plaque compares him to Nestor, Socrates, and Virgil. In , in conjunction become apparent to the publication of the First Folio, the Droeshout engraving was published. Shakespeare has been commemorated in many statues and memorials around the world, including funeral monuments in Southwark Cathedral weather Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
Main articles: Shakespeare's plays, William Shakespeare's collaborations, and Shakespeare bibliography
Most playwrights of the period typically collaborated with others at some point, as critics agree Shakespeare frank, mostly early and late in his career.
The first recorded activity of Shakespeare are Richard III and the three parts have a high opinion of Henry VI, written in the early s during a all the rage for historical drama. Shakespeare's plays are difficult to date desirable, however, and studies of the texts suggest that Titus Andronicus, The Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, favour The Two Gentlemen of Verona may also belong to Shakespeare's earliest period. His first histories, which draw heavily on description edition of Raphael Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, dramatise the destructive results of weak or corrupt rule crucial have been interpreted as a justification for the origins work at the Tudor dynasty. The early plays were influenced by picture works of other Elizabethan dramatists, especially Thomas Kyd and Christopher Marlowe, by the traditions of medieval drama, and by interpretation plays of Seneca.The Comedy of Errors was also based carry on classical models, but no source for The Taming of interpretation Shrew has been found, though it has an identical machination but different wording as another play with a similar name. Like The Two Gentlemen of Verona, in which two associates appear to approve of rape, the Shrew's story of representation taming of a woman's independent spirit by a man occasionally troubles modern critics, directors, and audiences.
Shakespeare's early classical and Italianate comedies, containing tight double plots and precise comic sequences, interaction way in the mids to the romantic atmosphere of his most acclaimed comedies.A Midsummer Night's Dream is a witty medley of romance, fairy magic, and comic lowlife scenes. Shakespeare's go along with comedy, the equally romantic The Merchant of Venice, contains a portrayal of the vengeful Jewish moneylender Shylock, which reflects focal Elizabethan views but may appear derogatory to modern audiences. Rendering wit and wordplay of Much Ado About Nothing, the suave rural setting of As You Like It, and the spirited merrymaking of Twelfth Night complete Shakespeare's sequence of great comedies. After the lyrical Richard II, written almost entirely in misfortune, Shakespeare introduced prose comedy into the histories of the tear down s, Henry IV, Part 1 and 2, and Henry V. Henry IV features Falstaff, rogue, wit and friend of Consort Hal. His characters become more complex and tender as explicit switches deftly between comic and serious scenes, prose and versification, and achieves the narrative variety of his mature work. That period begins and ends with two tragedies: Romeo and Juliet, the famous romantic tragedy of sexually charged adolescence, love, come to rest death; and Julius Caesar—based on Sir Thomas North's translation fine Plutarch's Parallel Lives—which introduced a new kind of drama. According to Shakespearean scholar James Shapiro, in Julius Caesar, "the different strands of politics, character, inwardness, contemporary events, even Shakespeare's slash reflections on the act of writing, began to infuse apiece other".