The Truth about William Shakespeare: Fact, Fiction and Modern Biographies

ISBN-13: 9780748646661 / Angielski / Twarda / 2012 / 208 str.

David Ellis

Opis

How can biographies of Shakespeare continue to appear when so little is known about him? And when what is known has been in the public domain for so long? In the past decade, the majority of these biographies have been published by distinguished Shakespeareans - shouldn't they know better? To solve this puzzle, David Ellis looks at the methods that Shakespeare's biographers have used to hide their lack of knowledge. At the same time, by exploring efforts to write a life of Shakespeare along traditional lines, it asks what kind of animal "biography" really is and how it should be written.

Spis treści

Preface; Acknowledgements; PART I; 1. Rules of the game; 2. Bricks without straw; 3. Forbears; 4. The female line and Catholicism; 5. Boyhood and youth; 6. Marriage; 7. The theatre; 8. Patronage, or who's who in the Sonnets; 9. Shakespeare and the love of men; 10. Shakespeare and the love of women; 11. Friends; 12. London life; 13. Politics; 14. Money;15. Retirement and death; 16. Post-mortem; PART II; 17. Gossip;18. The post-modernist challenge; 19. The argument from expertise; 20. Trahison des clercs?; Notes; Index.