Soul of the Age
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| |||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £1.40
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Soul of the Age: The Life, Mind and World of William Shakespeare for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £1.40, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
Product Description
Review
'An excellent writer ! he achieves a resonant and complex portrait, constantly alert to new lines of enquiry and unexpected conclusions ... A triumph of precision, learning and intelligent innovation' - Charles Nicholl, Sunday Telegraph, Book of the Week 'Bate probably knows as much as any single person can know about Shakespeare ... Surprising, fresh, exhilarating, brilliant' - Richard Eyre, Guardian 'Wholehearted applause for Bate's portrayal of Shakespeare's world ... it is pure pleasure ... I defy any reader, no matter how saturated in Shakespeare, not to find something new here' Independent on Sunday
Product Description
How did plague turn Shakespeare from a jobbing hack into a courtly poet? How did Bottom's dream rewrite the Bible? How did Shakespeare's plays lead to the deaths of an earl and a king? And why was he the one dramatist of his generation never to be imprisoned?
Weaving a dazzling tapestry of Elizabethan beliefs and obsessions, private passions and political intrigues, Soul of the Age leads us on an exhilarating tour of the extraordinary, colourful and often violent world that shaped and informed Shakespeare's thinking. Written by one of the world's leading experts, it combines almost everything there is to know about the man and his work in one sensational narrative, and brings us closer than ever to understanding what being Shakespeare was actually like.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I would imagine Jonathan Bate's lectures are a joy - his books certainly make for excellent company. Having enjoyed his The Genius of Shakespeare many years ago, this book is an excellent follow-up. This book seeks to put Shakespeare in context - and, as the subtitle explains, lay out something of the bard's 'life, mind and world'. Of course, extensive biographical details are elusive - which in part explains why curiosity if not controversy about his identity is rife. Bate nevertheless manages to assemble as thorough a picture as possible. He draws on a wide range of historical scholarship (for example, in his depiction of the legal system at the time, as well as the sort of Tudor grammar school education that Shakespeare will certainly have received - then providing good evidence from its manifestations in the plays). He is particularly good at using this to debunk the "Shakespeare's not Shakespeare brigade" - e.g. illustrating it with details from the plays that only a Warwickshire lad could possibly have known.
The structure of the book is so brilliantly simple and yet (to my knowledge), no one has thought of it before: structure the book around the 7 ages of man, from Jaques renowned speech from As You Like It. This makes the book easy to follow - but also allows scope for in-depth explorations of Shakespeare's progress through life and the world, even where the biographical details are minimal. There were moments where I got a bit bogged down (not being a Tudor historian) - e.g. in the business of Essex's fall and its impact on Shakespeare and the theatres. But most of the time, I was gripped and looking forward to the next pearl or insight. Especially fun and engaging were the comparisons between Elizabeth I's speech at Tilbury and Churchill's Battle of Britain speech; the section on the Tudor engagement with the Islamic world of the Ottoman empire; the analysis of Shakespeare's political acumen (especially his engagement with Machiavelli etc).
Thoroughly recommended for anyone who wants to get a sense of the man and his plays - and will give plenty to listen and look out for in the works. So many of the resonances of metaphors or contemporary references in the text can now be enjoyed once again.
The structure of the book is so brilliantly simple and yet (to my knowledge), no one has thought of it before: structure the book around the 7 ages of man, from Jaques renowned speech from As You Like It. This makes the book easy to follow - but also allows scope for in-depth explorations of Shakespeare's progress through life and the world, even where the biographical details are minimal. There were moments where I got a bit bogged down (not being a Tudor historian) - e.g. in the business of Essex's fall and its impact on Shakespeare and the theatres. But most of the time, I was gripped and looking forward to the next pearl or insight. Especially fun and engaging were the comparisons between Elizabeth I's speech at Tilbury and Churchill's Battle of Britain speech; the section on the Tudor engagement with the Islamic world of the Ottoman empire; the analysis of Shakespeare's political acumen (especially his engagement with Machiavelli etc).
Thoroughly recommended for anyone who wants to get a sense of the man and his plays - and will give plenty to listen and look out for in the works. So many of the resonances of metaphors or contemporary references in the text can now be enjoyed once again.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
A compelling portrait of Shakespeare and his times. I found I could not put it down and it enhanced my opinion o0f the reasons behind Shakespeare's plays and enhanced the view of the world at the time in which he wrote. Invaluable accompaniament to enjoyment of Shakespeare both to read and to watch in the theatre.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
"Fascinating - not completely convincing, and as with all Shakespeare 'biographies' selective in what it includes and excludes. That said, the indepth background of the period is rivetting reading, and he is certainly not squeamish when it comes to dipping into the depths of human depravity."
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Pleasant read
The book is build up according to the seven ages of life, infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, panttaloon and oblivion. Read more
Published 3 months ago by KCV16
A must even for non Stratfordians
You could be surprised that such a intimate connoisseur of Shakespeare, what Jonathan Bate without any doubt is, would pick up Jaques speech of the seven ages as formal concept of... Read more
Published 12 months ago by MG
Bringing insight into the genius of Shakespeare
While reading this book, it becomes so very apparent that we are unlikely to create another Shakespeare ever. Read more
Published on 8 July 2009 by Keith Lawson
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
