This is Shakespeare - Emma Smith

A THE TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2019

'The best introduction to the plays I've read, perhaps the best book on Shakespeare, full stop' Alex Preston, Observer

'It makes you impatient to see or re-read the plays at once' Hilary Mantel

A genius and prophet whose timeless works encapsulate the human
condition like no others. A writer who surpassed his contemporaries in
vision, originality and literary mastery. Who wrote like an angel,
putting it all so much better than anyone else.
Is this Shakespeare? Well, sort of.

But
it doesn't really tell us the whole truth. So much of what we say about
Shakespeare is either not true, or just not relevant, deflecting us
from investigating the challenges of his inconsistencies and flaws. This
electrifying new book thrives on revealing, not resolving, the
ambiguities of Shakespeare's plays and their changing topicality. It
introduces an intellectually, theatrically and ethically exciting writer
who engages with intersectionality as much as with Ovid, with economics
as much as poetry: who writes in strikingly modern ways about
individual agency, privacy, politics, celebrity and sex. It takes us
into a world of politicking and copy-catting, as we watch him emulating
the blockbusters of Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Kyd, the Spielberg
and Tarantino of their day; flirting with and skirting round the
cut-throat issues of succession politics, religious upheaval and
technological change. The Shakespeare in this book poses awkward
questions rather than offering bland answers, always implicating us in
working out what it might mean.

This is Shakespeare. And he needs your attention.