The Life of William Shakespeare

List of Illustrations
 
Preface and Acknowledgements
 
List of Abbreviations
 
The Shakespeare Family Tree
 
1. "Born into the World": 1564--1571
 
2. "Nemo Sibi Nascitur": 1571--1578
 
3. "Hic et Ubique": 1578--1588
 
4. "This Man's Art and That Man's Scope": 1588--1592
 
5. "Tiger's Hearts": 1592--1593
 
6. "The Dangerous Year": 1593--1594
 
7. "Our Usual Manager of Mirth": 1594--1595
 
8. "The Strong'st and Surest Way to Get": 1595--1596
 
9. "When Love Speaks": 1595--1596
 
10. "You Had a Father, Let Your Son Say So": 1596--1598
 
11. "Unworthy Scaffold": 1598--1599
 
12. "These Words Are Not Mine": 1599--1601
 
13. "Looking Before and After": 1600--1603
 
14. "This Most Balmy Time": 1603--1605
 
15. "Past the Size of Dreaming": 1606--1609
 
16. "Like an Old Tale": 1609--1611
 
17. "The Second Burden": 1612--1616
 
18. "In the Mouths of Men": 1616 and After
 
Bibliography
 
Index

Lois Potter recently retired as Ned B. Allen Chair at the University of Delaware. She has also taught at the Universities of Aberdeen, Leicester, and Paris III-Sorbonne Nouvelle, and at Tsuda College, Tokyo. Her publications include Twelfth Night: Text and Performance (1986), the Arden edition of The Two Noble Kinsmen (1997, 2001), and Shakespeare in Performance: Othello (2002). She is also the editor of two volumes in the Revels History of Drama in English series (1981 and 1984), and has been a frequent reviewer of plays for the Times Literary Supplement, Shakespeare Quarterly, and Shakespeare Bulletin.

"Two of the Mighty dead have been brought back to life in exemplary fashion: Shakespeare in Lois Potter's The Life of William Shakespeare: A Critical Biography, which very cleverly uses expert theatre-knowledge as a way of making her enigmatic subject seem plausibly substantial; and Keats in Nicholas Roe's John Keats: A New Life, which puts the poet properly in his place." ( The Guardian , 24 November 2012) "This study will have wide appeal to readers who wish to expand their appreciation of the works of William Shakespeare. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers." ( Choice , 1 November 2012) "A richly suggestive, undogmatic book in which Lois Potter ranges across the entire canon and the period that helped produce it." ( Around the Globe , 1 October 2012) "Lois Potter's Life of William Shakespeare, ranks with the most distinguished examples of its kind ... Her achievement lies in her catholicity, her simultaneous commitment to matters personal, historical, theatrical, literary, cultural. She exhibits an absolute command of the available facts, a lifetime's acquaintance with the works gained in teaching and playgoing, an unparalleled familiarity with theatrical history from 1567 to the present, and a talent for connecting the fictional and the actual." ( Times Literary Supplement , 10 August 2012)

"Two of the Mighty dead have been brought back to life in exemplary fashion: Shakespeare in Lois Potter's The Life of William Shakespeare: A Critical Biography, which very cleverly uses expert theatre-knowledge as a way of making her enigmatic subject seem plausibly substantial; and Keats in Nicholas Roe's John Keats: A New Life, which puts the poet properly in his place." (The Guardian, 24 November 2012)
 
"This study will have wide appeal to readers who wish to expand their appreciation of the works of William Shakespeare. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers." (Choice, 1 November 2012)
 
"A richly suggestive, undogmatic book in which Lois Potter ranges across the entire canon and the period that helped produce it." (Around the Globe, 1 October 2012)
 
"Lois Potter's Life of William Shakespeare, ranks with the most distinguished examples of its kind ... Her achievement lies in her catholicity, her simultaneous commitment to matters personal, historical, theatrical, literary, cultural. She exhibits an absolute command of the available facts, a lifetime's acquaintance with the works gained in teaching and playgoing, an unparalleled familiarity with theatrical history from 1567 to the present, and a talent for connecting the fictional and the actual." (Times Literary Supplement, 10 August 2012)