"The Lodger Shakespeare: His Life on Silver Street" by Charles Nicholl

As with interest in the written word, anything on Shakespeare will immediately draw my attention.  Does this that purports knowledge of the man's writings - or the man himself - bring me any closer to understanding how he mastered the language of his day?

With this book, though non-fiction, I was than certain whether it involved an actual story of Shakespeare or if Shakespeare's name was being used metaphorically.  What I discovered was a study based upon a deposition Shakespeare gave in a court case involving the family who owned the residence where he was a 'lodger'.

If I comprehended this aspect of Shakespeare's life, the man spent time away from his home for the purpose of working on his writings.  I don't believe this ever becomes explicitly stated.  It is what I inferred from the text explaining his lodger status.

As a lodger in this home, he apparently became witness to a marriage in which the father of the bride pledged a certain dowry to his prospective son-in-law, which was never paid.  The son-in-law takes the father-in-law to court, and hence one has the story.  The remainder of the book revolves around English life of that time period, telling of it through the families involved in the suit and Shakespeare's existence upon Silver Street, the area in which this residence lies.

I am unfortunately a reader who requires a certain amount of narrative to any book.  When there is no story to capture my focus, even when the information itself would be compelling, my attention drifts and wanders, searching for linear direction forward.  Thereby, I cannot comment much beyond what I have thus far written.  This is a treatise on the period in which Shakespeare lived, told through the lives of Shakespeare himself and the individuals involved in the suit.  For a Shakespeare scholar, or any soul familiar with Elizabethan England, such a book would present it a veritable treasure found.  Familiar with that time period, or remnants of that time period, I would surmise for such a person this would be like a trip along memory paths beloved; for one such as myself, it was an exercise in discipline to which I scored little more than an average 'C' in grade.