Shakespeare: The Biography

London: Chatto & Windus, 2005. Fifth impression. Hardback. xiii, 546pp. Dust jacket in a protective sleeve. This is a living attempt to reach into the world and heart of Shakespeare. Peter Ackroyd creates an intimate and immediate connection with his subject, so that the book reads like the work of a contemporary meeting Shakespeare afresh on his own ground. Ackroyd places him within the landscape of his time. He walks the reader through sixteenth century Stratford and London like a native of that century. He not only richly conjures up the texture of Shakespeare's time, but also imparts an immense amount of vivid and fascinating detail about place, period and background. This biography is neither an academic description nor a didactic analysis. It is written with intuition and imagination unique to Peter Ackroyd, a book by a writer about a writer, brilliant and straightforward, it vividly presents the reader with the circumstances of Shakespeare's life and art. Sections of illustrations. Book in very good condition. Just a little toning to page edges. Very clean and bright internally. Dust jacket very good. Unclipped. Only the slightest edge wear and a little colour fade to spine.