Product Description

The theatre for which Shakespeare wrote and acted was a cut-throat commercial entertainment industry. Yet his plays were also intensely alert to the social and political realities of their times. Shakespeare had to make concessions to the commercial world, for the theatre company in which he was a shareholder had to draw some 1,500 to 2,000 paying customers a day into the round wooden walls of the playhouse to stay afloat and competition from rival companies was fierce. The key was not so much topicality - with government censorship and with repertory companies recycling the same scripts for years. Instead, Shakespeare had to engage with the deepest desires and fears of his audience. Will in the World is about an amazing success story that has resisted explanation: it aims to be the first fully satisfying account of Shakespeare's character and the blossoming of his talent. There have, of course, been many biographies of Shakespeare. The problem each one faces is the thin amount of material surrounding his life. They lead us through the available traces but leave us no closer to understanding how the playwright's astonishing achievements came about. The real-world sources of Shakespeare's language - of his fantasies, passions, fears, and desires - lie outside the scope of these earlier books. Will in the World will set out to recover the links between Shakespeare and his world and with them to construct a full and vital portrait of the man. Its purpose is to know the magician himself, as well as his magic tricks, and to experience the touch of the real. It is a journey that centres on the perils and pleasures of Shakespeare's unfolding imaginative generosity - his ability to enter into others, to confer upon them his own strength of spirit, to make them live and breathe as independent beings as no other artist who ever lived has done.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #50109 in Books
• Published on: 2005-06-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 432 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Why should we read Stephen Greenblatt’s Will in the World? There have been innumerable biographies of William Shakespeare, but the greatest of all writers remains the great unknowable. We know about the petty business dealings, the death of his son, his career as a man of the theatre, and (of course) the seemingly contemptuous bequeath to Anne Hathaway of his ‘second best bed’. But any biographer is left scratching for much more than that--apart, of course, from adducing what can be read of the man's characters from his work (an enterprise fraught with danger). Shakespeare is not Hamlet, Lear or Benedict--though, of course, he is also, in a real sense, all three.

What makes Greenblatt's account the most valuable in many years (literally so, since famously massive advances were paid for it) is the synthesis of incisive scholarship, immense enthusiasm for the subject and an unparalleled ability to conjure up the Elizabethan world with colour and veracity. If the author's conclusion's about the genius at the centre of his narrative are open to question, Will in the World is none the worse for that--Greenblatt enjoys provoking the reader, and the result is an energetic conjuring of a brilliant man and those around him (Christopher Marlowe and Ben Johnson are evoked with enviable skill, as are such figures as the prototype for Falstaff, Robert Green).

With something of the vigour of the Bard’s writing, Greenblatt takes us through the bawdy, teeming Bankside district (centuries before it became a tourist destination), and the Machiavellian, dangerous world of the court--in fact, all the splendour and misery of the Elizabethan age--and at the centre of it all, its greatest artist. The Will we meet here may owe much to Greenblatt’s very personal interpretation, but the portrait is fascinating.--Barry Forshaw

Adam Gopnik's 6-page review in the New Yorker (the 1st review)
The most complexly intelligent and sophisticated, and yet the most keenly enthusiastic, study of the life…that I have ever read

From the Publisher
Aimed at the broadest possible readership, this is the fullest and most brilliant account ever written of Shakespeare's life, his work and his age.

Customer Reviews

The speculative approach
Greenblatt's approach is to take the life of Shakespeare, about which we know so much less than we'd like to, and allow himself to speculate, based on his knowledge of the times and Shakespeare's works, in order to flesh out the bare-bones story.

In some cases this works, in others it doesn't. For me the most exciting chapters dealt with Shakespeare's being involved in the pellmell world of Elizabethan playwriting. When Shakespeare arrived in London to begin his career as a writer, he found himself caught up in a revolution in stage-craft, led by a group of Oxford wits, foremost among them being Marlowe, the inventor of the "mighty line". Greenblatt speculates on how Shakespeare, not university educated, would have fit in with this crowd first as an interesting newcomer, then as something of an upstart whose talent offended those (like Robert Greene) who were so obviously inferior to him.

A chapter that didn't work for me, on the other hand, was the one on Shakespeare's marriage. Greenblatt concludes, from evidence in the plays, that Shakespeare's marriage was an unhappy one. The trouble is, to make his point, Greenblatt has to ignore any alternative interpretations, and so although he admits he is speculating, there is no real feel that he is covering all the options. For instance, Greenblatt damns Shakespeare's infamous final will (in which he leaves his wife his second-best bed), without considering the alternative interpretation that this was a common occurrence for the time, the second-best bed being the one they had shared throughout their married life, as the best one was left for guests.

This is certainly not an exhaustive survey of Shakespeare's life. It stands back and considers Shakespeare the man, focusing only on those details which throw light on certain aspects of his character. This makes it a good read to add to other readings about Shakespeare, but certainly not "the best one-volume life of Shakespeare yet", as quoted on the cover.

Trenchant
This is a strongly written, thoughtful, sometimes a little too conjectural study of Shakespeare by one of the pioneers of New Historicism. Greenblatt understands the Renaissance milieu superbly, which allows plenty of valuable insights into the background to the plays, such as his knowledge of the glove trade and his Catholic sympathies. There are perceptive readings of the plays, but this is a book that visualizes Shakespeare as a person, rather than just as the mind behind a canon of texts. The chief value of the book is in its grasp of the relationship between the plays and the Elizabethan and Jacobean world.

Superb Book for Amateurs and Professionals
This book manages to be both an easy read for average readers plus appeals to Shakespeare experts. It is not necessary to read Shakespeare's plays to understand the present book - although the book motivates one in the direction of seeing them again or for the for the first time - but few books combine the present level of insight with the easy to read popular writing style as found here.

I have read a few other popular biographies on Shakespeare including the popular biography by Anthony Burgess, Shakespeare, written in 1970 and the 2003 book by Frank Kermode The Age of Shakespeare. These are aimed at average readers and they are both relatively easy to read and both give some insights into the man and his times. The latter book is similar in goals to the present book but it is much shorter and has a more awkward writing style than the present book.

The present book is far above these two earlier popular books, both in detail, information, insights, and ease of reading. Also, the bibliography at the rear that must contain at least 200 other references. The bibliography is in a "notes" format, it is about 16 pages long, and includes many comments and opinions by the author.

The outstanding feature of the present book is that it is very rich in detail and the author is able to interpret many things in Shakespeare's personal life by working backwards from phrases, characters, religious references, school references, alcohol, etc found in his plays and other writings. Following a rough chronological sequence, the author makes the link to Shakespeare's off stage life, including his father, his childhood, religion, later his children, business, marriage, etc.

Many readers will appreciate the book for all its detail. It has a lot of detail and photographs in the almost 400 pages. But the book is a lot more than just detail. It interprets the plays and gives meaning and interpretation to the passages and presents us with ideas on how Shakespeare decided to write a certain passage or why a certain character is in the play, or why they have a certain demeanor, or phrase, or word, or line and why the actor is dressed a certain way or acts in a certain fashion, and how they are connected to external events.

For example, and this must be just one of at least one hundred or two hundred comments and connections, the author explains that lurking in Shakespeare's subconscious are likely many thoughts on his father, the former mayor and powerful Stratford figure who later in life becomes a failure eventually succumbs to financial pressures and must sell off his wife's family farm properties to stay solvent, or simply to make end meets, or to buy alcohol. The following is one of many connections to those thoughts of his father, and his failings as a person. This is typical of Greenblatt's writing and style in the book.

After the author explains the connection he quotes (sometimes two or three different plays - but here one for example):

"God save thee, my sweet boy" says the father figure Falstaff to the young Hal

Hal replies:

"Fall to thy prayers.
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!
I have long dreamt of such a kind of man,
So surfeit-swelled, so old, and so profane;
But being awake, I do despise my dream.
(2 Henry IV, 5.5.41, 45-49).

For myself that is a clear explanation that almost anyone can understand, and it is typical of the clarity found in the book. This type of example is repeated over and over again and make up the theme of the book, that is, a series of connections and discussions and comments linking Shakespeares creative writing to the possible sources of inspiration in his background and family.

The book has received a number of outstanding book reviews from Shakespeare experts, artistic directors, professional book reviewers, etc. When you read the book you will understand the attraction of the book. It is easy to read, very easy to read, surprisingly easy to read, but it is also a complicated and well thought book that will delight a broad cross section of readers each with different levels of knowledge about the plays, the man, and his times.

5 stars