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More than 400 years after his plays graced London’s stages and the British monarchs’ gaze, William Shakespeare remains a staple of the English literary canon.

Playwright, poet, and actor William Shakespeare lived an era of exploration, entering the world in the the same orbit as Galileo (also born in 1564), and into a monarchy on the cusp of embracing exploration and colonization in service of becoming an empire. Along with his role as a central theatrical figure of the early 1600s--and a lasting contributor to the genre--he has augmented the English lexicon. Shakespeare coined new phrases and reinvented words, and his works are also credited with being the first place that many previously unrecorded words (1,700!) were documented in print.

Born into a family of eight children of merchant and landowner parents, Shakespeare’s life afforded him an education and the chance to pursue a career in the theatrical arts. As a student in Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare likely received an education through age 14 or 15, with a typical course of study including exposure to Latin classics and plays.

At 18, Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, who would bear three children: Susannah and twins Hamnet (who died at 11) and Judith.  (Shakespeare and Hathaway’s daughters would eventually bear four grandchildren, but no direct descendents from these lines remain.) 

While Shakespeare’s family remained in Stratford, his theatrical life occurred separate from them, in London. He is believed to have begun writing for theatrical production before the 1590s.  About a half-dozen of his plays would appear on London’s stages, including at The Rose, before the plague struck London in 1592-1593 and closed theaters.  During this interruption in public performance (an era that COVID has perhaps made more relatable), Shakespeare focused on poetry.  His two long narrative poems, “Venus and Adonis” and “The Rape of Lucrece” were published in 1593 and 1594 respectively.

When theaters reopened, Shakespeare invested as a founding member and shareholder of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, a theater company sponsored by Lord Chamberlain under the reign of Elizabeth I.  In 1603, the group was renamed The King’s Men when King James I took the throne and became their patron.

By the numbers, which is a handy (and common) way of enumerating Shakespeare’s body of work, he wrote…

• 154 sonnets, which were published as a collection in 1609, during Shakespeare’s life.  Each sonnet has a designated number (e.g., Sonnet #18.  The particular sonnet structure has become so associated with Shakespeare that it’s now known as the Shakespearean (or English) sonnet.
• Two narrative poems, as mentioned above, and at least one shorter poem, “The Phoenix and Turtle.”
• At least 38 plays: 14 comedies, 12 tragedies, and 10 histories. 
• During Shakespeare’s lifetime, 18 of these plays appeared in print as quartos, which were small single-play publications.  
• The remaining plays appeared in print posthumously in folio form.

After Shakespeare’s death in 1616, two of his King’s Men colleagues published the previously published 18 plays along with 18 additional plays in Mr. William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies, also known as the First Folio (1623).  This substantive publication categorized all 36 plays, as stated in the work’s title, into three sub-genres. The First Folio includes a list of “The Names of the Principall Actors in all these Playes,” confirming that 26 men made up the company of actors in Shakespeare’s productions.  At the time, men and boys tended to play all roles in theatrical productions, including the parts of women and girls.  

Much about Shakespeare has been the source of speculation, from his birthday to his image to the authorship of his plays.  Some of these mysteries have been more easily resolved than others. His recorded baptismal date of April 26 implies he was born several days earlier, so his birthday is traditionally celebrated on April 23. Two existing images are believed to be accurate depictions of Shakespeare. One, an engraving by Martin Droeshout, appears in the First Folio. 

As to the authorship of his plays, the case is harder to resolve; “anti-Stratfordian” scholars have theorized that “Shakespeare” served as a pseudonym, and, while it’s generally accepted that Shakespeare had co-authors--e.g., John Fletcher for The Two Noble Kinsmen--greater consensus has been harder to achieve.

The 21st century has brought with it attempts to “decolonize” the canon, bringing Shakespeare’s works into scrutiny. To what extent has Shakespeare’s reputation been artificially buoyed by attempts to elevate his “genius” in alignment with views of Anglo-Saxon superiority?  Is his oeuvre obsolete, with limited appeal, or does it still hold relevance for a broader population?

Shakespeare's Plays

Written by Marina K. Ruben

References and Further Reading

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