Publication Date: 30/03/2023 ISBN: 9780008238384 Category:

Shakespeare’s Book

Chris Laoutaris

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Publication Date: 30/03/2023 ISBN: 9780008238384 Category:
Hardback

£25.00

Quantity:

Description

‘A lively picture of multiple operators scrambling to steal a march on the competition . . . Lavishly detailed’
FINANCIAL TIMES

‘This is Shakespearean scholarship at its best, brilliantly researched yet compulsively readable. It’s a book for our times, enduringly fascinating and appealing to both enthusiasts and the general reader. Highly recommended!’ ALISON WEIR

FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE SUMMER

A BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

A BBC RADIO 4 FRONT ROW NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

AN AUSTRALIAN BOOK REVIEW BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

The year 2023 marks the 400th anniversary of Mr William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies, known today simply as the First Folio. It is difficult to imagine a world without The Tempest, Twelfth Night, Antony and Cleopatra, The Winter’s Tale and Macbeth, but these are just some of the plays that were only preserved thanks to the astounding labour of love that went into creating the first collection.

Shakespeare’s Book: The Intertwined Lives Behind the First Folio charts, for the first time, the manufacture of the First Folio against a turbulent backdrop of seismic political events and international tensions that intersected with the lives of its creators. Shakespeare scholar Dr Chris Laoutaris uncovers the friendships, bonds, social ties and professional networks that facilitated the production of Shakespeare ‘ s book, as well as the personal challenges, tragedies and dangers that threatened its completion. And he considers how Shakespeare himself, before his death, may have influenced the ways in which his own public identity would come to be enshrined in the First Folio, shaping the transmission of his legacy to future generations and determining how the world would remember him ‘not of an age, but for all time’.

‘Beautifully written and utterly compelling… comprises all the drama, intrigue and surprises of a Shakespeare play’ Tracy Borman

Publisher Review

PRAISE FOR SHAKESPEARE AND THE COUNTESS 'A splendid and original book' Sunday Telegraph, Book of the Week ' Fabulous! ... A gripping tale that enables us to see Shakespeare in a new light ... I could not recommend it highly enough' Alison Weir 'Greatly enjoying Shakespeare and the Countess ... Fascinating how much archives can still yield' Stanley Wells 'A work of historical and literary detection which takes us straight to the heart of religious politics in Elizabethan England ... there is a great deal to admire in this hugely ambitious book' Frances Wilson, New Statesman

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