WILL IN THE WORLD: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare -- Stephen Greenblatt

W.W. Norton & Company -- tpb
New York -- ©2004 -- 407pp
ISBN: 0-393-32737-x

Bringing together little-known historical facts and little-noticed elements of Shakespeare's plays, Greenblatt makes inspired connections between the life and the works and delivers "a dazzling and subtle biography" (Richard Lacayo, Time). Readers will experience Shakespeare's vital plays again as if for the first time, but with greater understanding and appreciation of their extraordinary depth and humanity.

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A very read-able book.

Most people familiar with literature are aware that despite being an incredibly popular writer, Shakespeare left very little information about himself. Here, Greenblatt accumulates all the previously written information about Shakespeare and combines it with a well researched history of the era. He draws likely scenarios (for instance: it is likely that as a young boy, Shakespeare attended a performance of a morality play by a traveling company -- Will's father was bailiff (mayor) of Stratford and ordered payment to be made to two traveling theatrical companies. The first performance, known as the Mayor's Play, was one in which the bailiff was expected to attend. Records show that in other similar situations, the children of the bailiff were often in attendance. Hence, likely that Will had been exposed to theatre at this time).

Greenblatt makes a good argument in all cases and even debunks a few previously alluded-to scenarios, offered by other writers.

We still can't know for certain how Will Shakespeare lived and loved, but we can continue to draw likely situations based on the history of the era that we do know. This book does it as well as any that I've read.