Who was Shakespeare?

The name Shakespeare is well known to all of us - of course we know of  his famous works and many of you may have read or studied some of his plays but who was the man himself. It may come as a surprise to many of you to know that Shakespeare was a husband and a father as well as an actor and writer in his fascinating life time. It is impossible to cover his life comprehensively here, so for brevity, I have compiled some of the more interesting facts about him.

Early Life

William Shakespeare was born in Stratford -upon-Avon in Warwickshire in April 1564 - a rural market town about 100 miles from London. As Woods (2003), in Shakespeare’s time it took three days and nights to get from there to London - the roads were bad and infested with robbers. The safest way to travel was in groups or on horseback with packhorse trains. (p.15)

The Shakespeares came from a rural farming background but William’s family were an aspiring middle class family with money and his father John was a prominent figure becoming mayor of Stratford at one point in his life.

Both sides of his parents came from a tiny cluster of villages in the Forest of Arden - his mother’s name was Mary Arden and she had known Shakespeare’s father John since childhood. Mary’s family came from a family of some status in Warwickshire and had links to some of the most powerful Catholic families in the shire. John and Mary married in 1557 when Mary was perhaps aged between her late teens and early twenties. In his life, John had also been a glover, a wool dealer and a money lender.

John and Mary’s first child, Joan died in infancy and a second daughter Margaret died within five months of birth. Another child Anne died at the age of seven. Besides William, two other sons, Richard and Edmund were born and a sister Anne was born when William was seven.

Education

Shakespeare would have begun his education at home at around about five years of age. In time, sources suggest he moved on to grammar school at about aged 7 and for seven years, he attended the Big School in Church Lane. Here he would have been introduced to Latin, Greek and great works of literature. The classical writers he studied influenced much of his poetry and plays and some of his ideas came from Ovid’s plays, the plays of Terence and Plautus and from Roman history.

Marriage

When Shakespeare was 18, he became friendly with the daughter of a husbandman and sheep farmer, Richard Hathaway. Anne, the daughter, became pregnant to Shakespeare in the August and she and William decided to marry and in 1583 their first child, Susanna was born. Sources suggest that they all lived together with William’s family under one roof in the Henley house at Stratford.  Soon, Anne became pregnant again with twins Hamnet and Judith but there were to be no more children for her and William.

The Lost Years

It is unknown exactly when Shakespeare left Stratford for London or what he did before becoming a professional actor and dramatist there. The period between 1585 and 1592 became known as ‘The Lost Years’ because there is very little historical material about his life during this time. One story tells that Shakespeare was caught poaching deer in Charlecote Park, near Stratford and went to London to avoid prosecution. Another, believes that Shakespeare became a schoolmaster for a number of years. It is thought however, that he arrived in London around 1586/7 and it is from this point that his famed began.

His Early Career

Some of Shakespeare’s early plays include ‘Henry VI’, ‘The Two Gentleman of Verona’ and ‘Titus Andronicus’. His first printed works were two poems ‘Venus and Adonis’ (1593) and ‘The Rape of Lucrece (1594) – these were both dedicated to the Earl of Southampton, a young courtier and favourite of Queen Elizabeth I and Shakespeare’s patron. Most of his sonnets were also written around this time but were not published until later in 1609.

In 1594, Shakespeare joined with other actors and dramatists to form a new theatre company under the patronage of Lord Chamberlain and for twenty years, Shakespeare was the regular dramatist producing about two plays a year.

Shakespeare’s success in the theatre made him a rich man and he bought one of the largest houses in Stratford as well as property in the area – about 107 acres.

Plays and Playhouses

Whilst drama was a wide spread activity in Shakespeare’s time, it is only in London where we see buildings especially built for the theatre. These buildings were tall, roughly circular in shape, open to the sky with a covered area over part of the stage and a roof running around the edge to protect the galleries.

As Griffing explains:
‘During Elizabethan times, audiences of all social and class backgrounds intermingled with one another when attending Shakespeare’s plays. It has even been recorded that Elizabeth I herself attended the theatre on several occasions. The populace in Elizabeth’s grade (e.g. gentry, knights, elected representatives) mostly likely paid the three-penny (or more) admission to get the best seat in the house, which meant the most comfort and finest location in the galleries. Two penny admission was most likely paid by citizens in the upper middle class like artisans or other actors. They were seated just like the wealthy, but the best places weren’t reserved for them. Also, both of these admissions prices provided a canopy from different weather conditions. On the other hand, people who paid the one-penny admission were susceptible to all weather conditions because the yard or pit, as the central area in front of the stage was called, had a completely open roof. These people were called groundlings and they were the apprentices, farmers, or blacksmiths. Groundlings had to stand in mud when it was raining and seats weren’t readily available. They did not attend the theatre often because of their low incomes, but they certainly attended when they had scrounged up enough money.’ (http://www.angelfire.com/fl5/theatre/jess.html)

In 1599, ‘The Lord Chamberlain’s Men’ built a new theatre, The Globe which was situated on the southbank of the Thames in Southwark and it is this theatre that Shakespeare’s plays were most identified with.

When James I took the throne in 1603, he granted royal patronage to Shakespeare’s acting company which then became the ‘King’s Men’. In 1609, the King’s Men acquired an indoor theatre called ‘The Blackfriars’ which was used in conjunction to the Globe.

Last Years in Stratford

From about 1611, it seems that Shakespeare detached himself from the London theatre to spend more time at his home in Stratford. He died at the age of 52 on 23 April 1616 and left substantial property to his family and colleagues in ‘The King’s Men.’ He was buried in the Holy Trinity Church. His wife Anne died in 1623 and was buried beside him. Shakespeare’s family line came to end with the death of his grand-daughter Elizabeth in 1670.