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  • Published: 5 December 2013
  • ISBN: 9780141912233
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 304

Shakespeare and Co.

Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Dekker, Ben Jonson, Thomas Middleton, John Fletcher and the Other Players in His Story




'Superbly enjoyable and inspiring' Bill Bryson

'Enjoyable, lively … such a pleasure to read … renders the drama of Shakespeare’s contemporaries more than fringe entertainment’ Independent

Shakespeare is one of the greatest of all English figures, considered a genius for all time. Yet as this enthralling book shows, he was at heart a man of the theatre, one among a community of artists in the teeming world of Renaissance London – from the enigmatic spy Christopher Marlowe to the self-aggrandizing Ben Jonson, from the actor Richard Burbage to the brilliant Thomas Middleton. By bringing Shakespeare’s contemporaries to life, Shakespeare & Co throws fresh new light on the man himself.

‘Warm, cheerful, generous … Wells sketches a whole gallery of Shakespeare’s fellow playwrights … He brings each vividly to life, making you feel that you’ve met them personally in some Blackfriars tavern’ Simon Callow

‘It was a time and place teeming with excitement, anecdote and incident, and Wells, in this richly enjoyable work, brings it to life with a novelist’s sense of the telling detail’ Dominic Dromgoole

‘Enthralling’ Observer

‘This is one of the most sane and exciting books on Shakespeare I have read for a long time’ Scotland on Sunday

  • Published: 5 December 2013
  • ISBN: 9780141912233
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 304
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