{"title":"Books by James Shapiro","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780571235797","title":"1606","description":"\u003cp\u003e1606: William Shakespeare and the Year of Lear traces Shakespeare's life and times from the autumn of 1605, when he took an old and anonymous Elizabethan play, \u003ci\u003eThe Chronicle History of King Leir\u003c\/i\u003e, and transformed it into his most searing tragedy, King Lear.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e1606 proved to be an especially grim year for England, which witnessed the bloody aftermath of the Gunpowder Plot, divisions over the Union of England and Scotland, and an outbreak of plague.  But it turned out to be an exceptional one for Shakespeare, unrivalled at identifying the fault-lines of his cultural moment, who before the year was out went on to complete two other great Jacobean tragedies that spoke directly to these fraught times: \u003ci\u003eMacbeth\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eAntony and Cleopatra\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFollowing the biographical style of 1599, a way of thinking and writing that Shapiro has made his own, 1606: William Shakespeare and the Year of Lear promises to be one of the most significant and accessible works on Shakespeare in the decade to come\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201729396914,"sku":"9780571235797","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780571235797.jpg?v=1786013860"},{"product_id":"9780571214815","title":"1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the Baillie Gifford Prize and the Baillie Gifford 'Winner of Winners' award in 2023\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHow did Shakespeare go from being a talented poet and playwright to become one of the greatest writers who ever lived? In this one exhilarating year we follow what he reads and writes, what he saw and who he worked with as he invests in the new Globe theatre and creates four of his most famous plays - \u003ci\u003eHenry V, Julius Caesar, As You Like It,\u003c\/i\u003e and, most remarkably, \u003ci\u003eHamlet.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis book brings the news, intrigue and flavour of the times together with wonderful detail about how Shakespeare worked as an actor, businessman and playwright, to create an exceptionally immediate and gripping account of an inspiring moment in history.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘A brilliant study, which carefully unpacks a single year in Shakespeare's life ... \u003cb\u003eThe audacious focus on just one year pays off magnificently\u003c\/b\u003e.’ \u003ci\u003eSunday Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘A\u003cb\u003e far richer, more intimate portrait of our greatest author than you're likely to find in any cradle-to-grave biography.\u003c\/b\u003e’ \u003ci\u003eDaily Mail\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘\u003cb\u003eGripping and illuminating\u003c\/b\u003e.’ \u003ci\u003eTelegraph\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘\u003cb\u003eA fascinating and entirely believable portrait of a talented workaholic ... Shapiro's informed enthusiasm and energetic prose is addictive.'\u003c\/b\u003e \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201803780274,"sku":"9780571214815","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780571214815_7c3372f7-7d53-43c3-94cb-195d5b6f0163.jpg?v=1786013569"},{"product_id":"9780571372775","title":"The Playbook","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘Tremendous.’ \u003c\/b\u003eDAVID HARE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘An absorbing, necessary book.’ \u003c\/b\u003eAHAD AKHTAR\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘Fascinating and energising.’\u003c\/b\u003e \u003ci\u003eFINANCIAL TIMES\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom the 'Winner of Winners' of the Baillie Gifford Prize, a timely and dramatic story of a utopian American experiment, and the self-serving politicians that engineered its downfall.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn 1935 the American public was presented with a radical opportunity. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEstablished under President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, the Federal Theatre Project would employ 12,000 artists, writers, and actors; stage more than 1,000 productions; and reach over 30 million people. Its output included Orson Welles’ directorial debut, a landmark modern dance programme, and shows that sought to shed light on the reality of racism, inequality and the dangers of fascism.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut within three years, an opportunistic Texas congressman had embarked on a campaign to destroy it, inventing a playbook that echoes into the culture wars of today.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom one of the world’s great storytellers, \u003ci\u003eThe Playbook \u003c\/i\u003eis an illuminating account of a terrifyingly prescient moment in twentieth-century American cultural history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":55205905596789,"sku":"9780571372775","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780571372775.jpg?v=1786015117"},{"product_id":"9780231178679","title":"Shakespeare and the Jews","description":"First published in 1996, James Shapiro's pathbreaking analysis of the portrayal of Jews in Elizabethan England challenged readers to recognize the significance of Jewish questions in Shakespeare's day. From accounts of Christians masquerading as Jews to fantasies of settling foreign Jews in Ireland, Shapiro's work delves deeply into the cultural insecurities of Elizabethans while illuminating Shakespeare's portrayal of Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. In a new preface, Shapiro reflects upon what he has learned about intolerance since the first publication of Shakespeare and the Jews.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56227723346293,"sku":"9780231178679","price":28.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780231178679_cddd73f5-42b4-4442-993a-3400103883bf.jpg?v=1786012542"},{"product_id":"9780571235773","title":"Contested Will","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor two hundred years after William Shakespeare's death, no one thought to argue that somebody else had written his plays.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSince then dozens of rival candidates - including The Earl of Oxford, Sir Francis Bacon and Christopher Marlowe - have been proposed as their true author. \u003ci\u003eContested Will \u003c\/i\u003eunravels the mystery of when and why so many people began to question whether Shakespeare wrote the plays (among them such leading writers and artists as Sigmund Freud, Henry James, Mark Twain, Helen Keller, Orson Welles, and Sir Derek Jacobi)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShakespeare scholar James Shapiro's fascinating search for the source of this controversy retraces a path strewn with fabricated documents, calls for trials, false claimants, concealed identity, bald-faced deception and a failure to grasp what could not be imagined. If \u003ci\u003eContested Will \u003c\/i\u003edoes not end the authorship question once and for all, it will nonetheless irrevocably change the nature of the debate by confronting what's really contested: are the plays and poems of Shakespeare autobiographical, and if so, do they hold the key to the question of who wrote them.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56291293921653,"sku":"9780571235773","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780571235773_dd28ff0d-3296-472f-89d0-8f27975fe124.jpg?v=1786013858"},{"product_id":"shakespeare-in-a-divided-america","title":"Shakespeare in a Divided America","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘Excellent.’ \u003ci\u003eNew Statesman\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘Outstanding.’ \u003ci\u003eIrish Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘Enthralling.’ \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘Shapiro at his best.’ \u003ci\u003eDaily Telegraph\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFrom the author of\u003ci\u003e 1599, a \u003c\/i\u003efresh perspective on the history of the United States – and a timely reminder of Shakespeare’s indelible influence.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShakespeare’s position as England’s national poet is unquestionable. But as James Shapiro illuminates in this revelatory new history, Shakespeare has long held an essential place in American culture too. Why, though, would a proudly independent republic embrace England’s greatest writer? Especially when his works enact so many of America’s darkest nightmares: interracial marriage, cross-dressing, same-sex love, tyranny and assassination? \u003cbr\u003eShapiro leads us to fascinating answers and startling stories.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57481451372917,"sku":"9780571338894","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780571338894.jpg?v=1786089713"},{"product_id":"othello-5","title":"Othello","description":"The story of Othello’s American life, showing that the hero’s tragedy is America’s own—from a best-selling writer and expert scholarWhile Shakespeare’s Othello, with a Black man as its tragic hero, was first staged in 1604, over two hundred years would pass before anyone other than a White actor in blackface played him. And it wasn’t until Paul Robeson’s star turn in 1943 that a Black actor played Othello on Broadway. Othello’s American life has long been intertwined with that of the nation, a journey marked by slavery, judicial lynching, Jim Crow, and the ongoing struggle for Black equality—a past that some would prefer to whitewash.   In this deeply researched book, James Shapiro retraces Othello’s American afterlife and challenges those sanitizing efforts. Othello was the name of a slave ship that sailed from Rhode Island. It was the name of an enslaved man executed for allegedly participating in a slave uprising in colonial New York. And it was the name Benjamin Franklin chose to call a child he had enslaved. Othello’s American life is a story of triumph as well as tragedy, embodied in the performances of such exceptional Black actors as Ira Aldridge, Paul Robeson, and Denzel Washington.   Drawing on literary, social, political, and theater history, Shapiro shows that Othello’s tragedy is inseparable from America’s own, reminding us of all that remains unresolved in the nation’s history.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57499272642933,"sku":"9780300267709","price":20.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}]}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-james-shapiro.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}