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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorWill in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare
Stephen Greenblatt · 430 pages
"How did Shakespeare become Shakespeare? Stephen Greenblatt enables us to see, hear, and feel how an acutely sensitive and talented boy, surrounded by the rich tapestry of Elizabethan life - full of drama and pageantry, and also cruelty and danger - could have become the world's greatest playwright. Greenblatt makes inspired connections between an entertainment presented to Queen Elizabeth on a vi
The Lodger: Shakespeare on Silver Street
Charles Nicholl · 377 pages
Shakespeare by Another Name: The Life of Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, the Man Who Was Shakespeare
Mark Anderson · 640 pages
Fools and Mortals
Bernard Cornwell · 384 pages
In the heart of Elizabethan England, Richard Shakespeare dreams of a glittering career in one of the London playhouses, a world dominated by his older brother, William. But he is a penniless actor, making ends meet through a combination of a beautiful face, petty theft and a silver tongue. As William's star rises, Richard's onetime gratitude is souring and he is sorely tempted to abandon family lo
Who Was William Shakespeare?
Celeste Davidson Mannis · 112 pages
The Invisible Woman
Claire Tomalin · 352 pages
A portrait of nineteenth-century actress Ellen Ternan, the woman who was the mistress of Charles Dickens, describing her secret relationship with the author.
The First Elizabeth
Carolly Erickson · 447 pages
In this biography, Carolly Erickson brings Elizabeth I to life and allows us to see her as a living, breathing, elegant, flirtatious, diplomatic, violent, arrogant, and outrageous woman who commands our attention, fascination, and awe. With the special skill for which she is acclaimed, Carolly Erickson electrifies the senses as she evokes with total fidelity the brilliant colors of Elizabethan clo
Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh
John Lahr · 765 pages
Here, celebrated drama critic John Lahr gives intimate access to the mind of one of the most brilliant dramatists of his century, whose plays reshaped the American theater and the nation's sense of itself. This astute, deeply researched biography sheds light on Williams's warring family, his guilt, his creative triumphs and failures, his sexuality and numerous affairs, his misreported death, even
The Queen's Conjuror: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee
Benjamin Woolley · 352 pages
Elizabeth and Essex: A Tragic History
Lytton Strachey · 288 pages
Dramatizes one of the most famous and most baffling romances in history -- between Elizabeth I, Queen of England, and Robert Devereux, the vital, handsome Earl of Essex. It began in May of 1587 when she was 53 and Essex was not yet 20 and continued until 1601.
Elizabeth & Leicester: Power, Passion, Politics
Sarah Gristwood · 528 pages
“Even their contemporaries felt that the relationship of Elizabeth and Robert transcended the details on practicality. There had to be some explanation for their lifelong fidelity, and those contemporaries put it down to 'synaptia', a hidden conspiracy of the stars, whose power to rule human lives no-one doubted: 'a sympathy of spirits between them, occasioned perhaps by some secret constellation'
Fosse
Sam Wasson · 736 pages
"We see Bob Fosse's legacy everywhere--from Broadway to "Billy Jean" to Beyonce's moves in the "Single Ladies" video. Yet in spite of Fosse's deep cultural significance, no biography has ever brought him fully to life, unveiling the man behind the bowler hat and the swaggering sex appeal. Now, acclaimed cultural historian Sam Wasson traces Fosse's numberless reinventions of himself over a career t
Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett
James Knowlson · 872 pages
Damned to Fame follows the reclusive literary giant's life from his birth in Foxrock, a rural suburb of Dublin, in 1906 to his death in Paris in 1989. Knowlson brilliantly re-creates Beckett's early years as a struggling author in Paris, his travels through Germany in 1936-37 as the Nazis were consolidating their power, his service in the French Resistance during World War II, and the years of li
Bess of Hardwick: First Lady of Chatsworth, 1527-1608
Mary S. Lovell
The Virgin Queen: Elizabeth I, Genius of the Golden Age
Christopher Hibbert · 287 pages
Maggie Smith
Michael Coveney · 353 pages
"No one does glamour, severity, girlish charm or tight-lipped witticism better than Dame Maggie Smith. Michael Coveney's biography shines a light on the life and career of a truly remarkable performer, one whose stage and screen career spans six decades. From her days as a West End star of comedy and revue, Dame Maggie's path would cross with those of the greatest actors, playwrights and directors
Oscar Wilde
Richard Ellmann · 680 pages
In this long-awaited biography, Wilde the legendary Victorian--brilliant writer and conversationalist, reckless flouter of social and sexual conventions--is brought to life. More astute and forbearing, yet more fallible than legend has allowed, Wilde is given here the dimensions of a modern hero. The author depicts Wilde's comet-like ascent on the Victorian scene and his equally dramatic sudden ec
The Pirate Queen: Queen Elizabeth I, Her Pirate Adventurers, and the Dawn of Empire
Susan Ronald · 471 pages
Dubbed the "pirate queen" by the Vatican and Spain's Philip II, Elizabeth I was feared and admired by her enemies. Extravagant, whimsical, and hot-tempered, Elizabeth was the epitome of power. Her visionary accomplishments were made possible by her daring merchants, gifted rapscallion adventurers, astronomer philosophers, and her stalwart Privy Council, including Sir William Cecil, Sir Francis Wal
Elizabeth I: A Feminist Perspective (Berg Women's Series)
Susan Bassnett · 152 pages
Ireland's Pirate Queen: The True Story of Grace O'Malley, 1530-1603
Anne Chambers · 205 pages