What we know about Shakespeare. It is not known when and how and just why Shakespeare left Stratford

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It is not known when and how and just why Shakespeare left Stratford. How can we explain this fact? Some writers think that he joined a company of actors. But it seems more natural to suppose that he left his native town because his father's business was in a bad way¹ and his own family was growing. What was more natural, under the circumstances, than moving to London?

Probably he walked through Oxford ['ɒksfəd] or bought a horse, selling it when he came to London. Some writers believe that having come to the capital Shakespeare found a job at a printer's shop or a lawyer's office,but it is more probable that he found a job connected with the theatre,either as a call-boy² in the building itself or as one of those who held the horses on which noble young men of the city came to the theatre. That he turned to the theatre rather than to business is not strange. Companies of actors had often visited Stratford when William was a boy. Indeed, the people of his native town seem to have been fond of the drama. It was a time of growing interest in the theatre. When Shakespeare was born in 1564, there was not a single theatre building in London. At the time of his death,fifty-two years later, there were at least nine, because of the development of the drama.

We know almost nothing about the first six years Shakespeare spent in the capital. But it is certain that he became an actor before he wrote for the stage. As an actor he was learning in the best possible school — the stage; as an author he probably tried his hand³ by writing bits for the plays of older playwrights. Without friends, without money, with a wife and children, he became known as a writer only in 1593. His first printed works were two long poems. The poems having been published without a name on the title-page,we know their author only because the dedication to the Earl of Southampton⁴ was signed "William Shakespeare".

Both as actor and playwright, Shakespeare's fame rapidly increased after 1594; in fact, in the eight years that followed he rose to the height of his powers. It was the time when he wrote Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, Hamlet, Measure for Measure and other great plays. In all, he was the author of over thirty plays, two poems and 154 sonnets. Together they are the most remarkable body⁵ of work that ever came from a human mind.

As an actor, he did not continue to be good, and from his sonnets it is clear that he thoroughly disliked this part of his work. Being tired of it, he did not appear on the stage after 1604.

Although Shakespeare made London his home, it is probable that he often visited Stratford, where his family continued to live. In 1611, at the height of his fame, he returned to Stratford twenty-six years after he had left it.

In the early spring of 1616 Shakespeare's youngest daughter, Judith ['ʤu:dɪθ], was married. A month later he made his will and on April 23, 1616, he died. That date, April 23, was also the date on which he was born fifty-two years before. William Shakespeare was buried in a fine old church at Stratford and over the place where he lies may still be seen the lines, written by himself:

"Good friend, for Jesus' sake⁶ forbear

To dig the dust, enclosed here;

Blessed be the man that spares these stones

And cursed be he that moves my bones. "

The bodies of many great Englishmen lie buried at Westminster Abbey in the capital of England. But, because of these lines, the grave of William Shakespeare in the beautiful church by the river he loved has remained unopened.

After What We Know About Shakespeare

by Samuel Thurber and Adelaide Witham