Shakespeare Histories

William Collins Books and Decca Records are proud to present ARGO Classics, a historic catalogue of classic prose and verse read by some of the world’s most renowned voices. Originally released as vinyl records, these expertly remastered stories are now available to download for the first time...

All of the Shakespeare plays within the Argo Classics catalogue are performed by the Marlowe Dramatic Society and Professional Players. The Marlowe was founded in 1907 with a mission to focus on effective delivery of verse, respect the integrity of texts and rescue neglected plays by Shakespeare’s contemporaries and the less performed plays of Shakespeare himself. The Marlowe has performed annually at Cambridge Arts Theatre since its opening in 1936 and continues to produce some of the finest actors of their generations.

*Winner of the 2024 Mississippi Institute of Arts & Letters Award for Life Writing* “A wickedly entertaining” (The New York Times) detective story that chronicles one Mississippi man’s relentless search for an authentic portrait of William Shakespeare. Following his divorce, down-and-out...

A collection of BBC Radio 3's iconic Shakespeare productions: six tragedies with all star casts including Michael Sheen, Juliet Stevenson, Kenneth Cranham, Corin Redgrave, Ken Stott, Geraldine James, Bill Wallis, Siân Phillips and Sophie Dahl.

The Age of Reason Begins brings together a fascinating network of stories in the discussion of the bumpy road toward the Enlightenment. This is the age of great monarchs and greater artists - on the one hand, Elizabeth I of England, Philip II of Spain, and Henry IV of France; on the other, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Montaigne, and Rembrandt. It also encompasses the heyday of Francis Bacon, Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and Descartes, the fathers of modern science and philosophy.

Love history? Know your stuff with History in an Hour. In a writing career that spanned over twenty years during the explosion of poetic and theatrical creativity of late Elizabethan and early Jacobean periods, William Shakespeare produced a body of work that has become the bedrock of human...

A “riotously readable…tender and affectionate” (Daily Mail, London) exploration of five hundred years of British history—from King Henry VIII to Queen Elizabeth II—as seen through the doorways of the exquisite Hampton Court Palace. Architecturally breathtaking and rich in splendid art...

An “extraordinarily brilliant” and “pleasurably naughty” (André Aciman) investigation into the Shakespeare authorship question, exploring how doubting that William Shakespeare wrote his plays became an act of blasphemy…and who the Bard might really be. The theory that Shakespeare may...

William Shakespeare may have been the greatest playwright in the English language, but how does he measure up as a historian? In this brilliant comparison between the events and characters in Shakespeare's history plays and the actual events that inspired them, acclaimed historian John Julius Norwich examines the nine works that together amount to an epic masterpiece on England's most fascinating period.

Friendship, betrayal, wisdom, humour, epic romance, jealousy, adventure, bravery and murder. There's everything in those iconic Shakespeare stories. His work transcends generations and appeals endlessly to other writers. His dramatic structures are both simple and complicated, intertwined with numerous relationships, which reappear in our lives again and again. This iconic collection of Shakespeare tales includes 20 of his most prominent works adapted by Edith Nesbit and transformed into modern English.

An absolutely joyous, gasp-out-loud achievement. - Stephen Fry A cathedral of consciousness - Shakespeare's uncanny insight into human nature finds us, unearthed here. - LionHeart, artist, poet, and BBC Radio London presenter Shakespeare had an ear and hand that was able to capture our everyday...

In Richard III’s Bodies from Medieval England to Modernity, Jeffrey Wilson tracks disability over 500 years, from Richard’s own manuscripts, early Tudor propaganda, and x-rays of sixteenth-century paintings through Shakespeare’s soliloquies, into Samuel Johnson’s editorial notes, the first play produced by an African American Theater company, Freudian psychoanalysis, and the rise of disability theater.

The New York Times bestseller from Margaret George—a captivating novel about history's most enthralling queen, the legendary Elizabeth Tudor. England’s greatest monarch has baffled and intrigued the world for centuries. But what was the Virgin Queen really like? Lettice Knollys—Elizabeth's...

Die Zeit von Shakespeare und Königin Elisabeth I. gilt als »goldenes Zeitalter«. Aber wie war es eigentlich wirklich, im England des 16. Jahrhunderts zu leben? Wir reisen mit Ian Mortimer zurück und spazieren durch die Straßen Londons.

Why Shakespeare? What explains our continued fascination with his poems and plays? In Living with Shakespeare, Susannah Carson invites 40 actors, directors, scholars, and writers to reflect on why his work is still such a vital part of our culture.

Welcome to the George Inn near London Bridge; a cosy, wood-panelled, galleried coaching house a few minutes' walk from the Thames. Consider this: who else has made this their local over the last 600 years? Chaucer and his fellow pilgrims almost certainly drank in the George on their way to Canterbury. Shakespeare may have popped in from the nearby Globe, and we know that Dickens definitely did. Mail carriers changed their horses here, while sailors drank here before sailing.

William Shakespeare found dozens of different ways to kill off his characters, and audiences today still enjoy the same reactions - shock, sadness, fear - that they did more than 400 years ago when these plays were first performed. But how realistic are these deaths, and did Shakespeare have the knowledge to back them up? Kathryn Harkup turns her discerning scientific eye to the Bard and the varied and creative ways his characters die.

In England in the Age of Shakespeare, Jeremy Black takes readers on a tour of life in the streets, homes, farms, churches, and palaces of the Bard’s era. Panning from play to audience and back again, Black shows how Shakespeare's plays would have been experienced and interpreted by those who paid to see them. From the dangers of travel to the indignities of everyday life in teeming London, Black explores the jokes, political and economic references, and small asides that Shakespeare’s audiences would have recognized.

William Shakespeare is one of the most recognizable names in the world. Regardless of country, language, age, or gender, people are familiar with the Bard’s work and his contributions to literature, theater, art, and music. His genius was so evident that he became famous and respected throughout England in his own lifetime, eventually earning the attention and patronage of the king himself.

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE A BOSTON GLOBE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR This remarkable work about women writers in the English Renaissance explodes our notion of the Shakespearean period by drawing us into the lives of four women who were committed to their craft long before...