Shakespeare: A Life in ArtShakespeare: A Life in Art brings together in a single volume Fraser's previously published two-volume biography (Young Shakespeare, 1988, and Shakespeare: The Later Years, 1992). This volume includes a new introduction, which looks back on the author's lifelong commitment to Shakespeare's work and seeks to find the pattern in his carpet.Fraser's approach places Shakespeare's work first but shows how the life and art interpenetrate, like the yolk and white of one shell. What Shakespeare was doing in Stratford and London underlies what he was writing, or more exactly, the two flow together. Most of the book is devoted to Shakespeare the man and artist, but it simultaneously throws light on his literary and personal relations with contemporaries such as Jonson, Marlowe, and others known as the University Wits. His experience as an actor and man of theater is absorbingly recounted here, as well as his relations to well-born patrons like the Earl of Southampton and Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon (England's Lord Chamberlain). In 1603 when James I ascended the throne, the Chamberlain's Men became the King's Men, passing under the sovereign's protection. How Shakespeare responded to his ambiguous role--he was both servant to the great and their remorseless critic--is another of Fraser's subjects. In short, Fraser's principal purpose is to advance our understanding of Shakespeare, at the same time throwing light on the work of the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets had the largest and most comprehensive soul. John Dryden, Shakespeare's first great critic, said that, and Fraser tries to estimate what he meant. |
From inside the book
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... poems come from or what they reflect needs selfdiscipline and a large dose of tact. Shakespeare, less forthcoming than Henry James, left no notebooks intimating connections. A few supers in the plays were known to him in person, like ...
... poems come from or what they reflect needs selfdiscipline and a large dose of tact. Shakespeare, less forthcoming than Henry James, left no notebooks intimating connections. A few supers in the plays were known to him in person, like ...
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... poems as well as the life record. despite what you often hear, the record is substantial. Many look behind it, however, from snobbery, mischievousness, or enthralled by an idée fixe, seeking another Shakespeare than the one it presents ...
... poems as well as the life record. despite what you often hear, the record is substantial. Many look behind it, however, from snobbery, mischievousness, or enthralled by an idée fixe, seeking another Shakespeare than the one it presents ...
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... mirrored in the plays and poems. This is my conceit, the old-fashioned word meaning a flight of fancy, but I ask the reader to indulge it and to believe that I am jesting in earnest. Essential Shakespeare is the playwright of the.
... mirrored in the plays and poems. This is my conceit, the old-fashioned word meaning a flight of fancy, but I ask the reader to indulge it and to believe that I am jesting in earnest. Essential Shakespeare is the playwright of the.
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... cling to each other and “choke their art,” that is, defeat its intents, so lessen their chance for survival. Plays or poems of the second rank evade this danger by sticking to exclusive categories whose sense is either/or.
... cling to each other and “choke their art,” that is, defeat its intents, so lessen their chance for survival. Plays or poems of the second rank evade this danger by sticking to exclusive categories whose sense is either/or.
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... poetic justice. He lacks the philosophic mind, and where evil comes from leaves him at a stand. St. Thomas, giving a cue to many, says the will never moves except under the shadow of good. This doesn't work for Shakespeare. Believing in ...
... poetic justice. He lacks the philosophic mind, and where evil comes from leaves him at a stand. St. Thomas, giving a cue to many, says the will never moves except under the shadow of good. This doesn't work for Shakespeare. Believing in ...
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actors Antony Blackfriars blood Burbage Caesar called Chamberlain’s church comedy comic Coriolanus Court Cymbeline dark daughter death died doesn’t Duke Earl Elizabeth England English Essex Falstaff famous father fellow Garden Globe God’s Hamlet hand Henry VIII hero’s heroine history plays honor isn’t John Shakespeare Jonson King Lear King’s knew later lived London looks Lord Love’s Macbeth man’s Marlowe Marlowe’s master means Measure for Measure Midsummer Night’s Dream moral nature Othello Paul’s perhaps play’s players playhouse playwright plot poem poet Puritans Queen readers remembered Richard Richard II Romeo says scene Shakespeare’s characters Shakespeare’s hero Shakespeare’s play Snitterfield sonnets Southampton stage story Stratford Street tale tells theater things thinks Thomas thought Titus Andronicus took tragedy Troilus and Cressida truth turned Twelfth Night villain wanted William words wrote young Shakespeare