Shakespeare LP - (Eminent Lives) Large Print by Bill Bryson (Paperback)

From the Back Cover

William Shakespeare, the most celebrated poet in the English language, left behind nearly a million words of text, but his biography has long been a thicket of wild supposition arranged around scant facts. With a steady hand and his trademark wit, Bill Bryson sorts through this colorful muddle to reveal the man himself.

Bryson documents the efforts of earlier scholars, from today's most respected academics to eccentrics like Delia Bacon, an American who developed a firm but unsubstantiated conviction that her namesake, Francis Bacon, was the true author of Shakespeare's plays. Emulating the style of his famous travelogues, Bryson records episodes in his research, including a visit to a basement room in Washington, D.C., where the world's largest collection of First Folios is housed.

Bryson celebrates Shakespeare as a writer of unimaginable talent and enormous inventiveness. His Shakespeare is like no one else's-the beneficiary of Bryson's genial nature, his engaging skepticism, and a gift for storytelling unrivalled in our time.

Review Quotes

"Bryson is a pleasant and funny guide to a subject at once overexposed and elusive." - Publishers Weekly
"Bill Bryson has yet to disappoint.... This examination is likely to stick with you because of Bryson's humor, deep love of language, and clear fondness for his subject." - Boston Globe
"Bryson uses an inimitably light touch and squeezes a vast subject down to manageable proportions. He is a warm and funny guide through the whole complicated morass of Shakespearean scholarship." - Financial Times
"A consistent pleasure...both accessible and intelligent.... Will and Bill are a great double act." - Houston Chronicle
"A telling glance at one of history's most unknowable figures." - Kirkus Reviews