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Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon, probably on 26th April 1564. -
Shakespeare was the son of John Shakespeare, a successful glover (glove-maker) and Mary Arden, the daughter of an affluent landowning family.
He was the third of eight children, and the eldest surviving son. -
William Shakespeare (bapt. 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He was the greatest writer in the English language and the world's greatest dramatist.
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At the age of 18, Shakespeare married 26-year-old Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna and twins Hamnet and Judith. -
Between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men. -
Shakespeare produced most of his works between 1589 and 1613.
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His works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems and a few other verses.
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The first works of Shakespeare are Richard III and the three parts of Henry VI, written in the early 1590s. -
The Lord Chamberlain's Men was a company of actors, or a "playing company".
It was founded during the reign of Elizabeth I of England in 1594.
The company became the King's Men in 1603 when King James ascended the throne and became the company's patron. -
A Midsummer Night's Dream
Merchant of Venice
Much Ado About Nothing
As You Like It
Twelfth Night
These complete Shakespeare's sequence of great comedies. -
Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare's most popular plays. -
He then wrote mainly tragedies until 1608.
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Built in 1599, this theatre was destroyed in a fire on 29th June 1613. The Globe was rebuilt by June 1614 and finally closed in 1642 and demolished in 1644. -
The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, was written between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words.
"To be or not to be; that is the question" -
Othello (full title: The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice) is a tragedy written probably in 1603. -
Macbeth (full title The Tragedie of Macbeth) is thought to have been first performed in 1606.
It is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy. -
King Lear is based on the mythological Leir of Britain.
The first known performance of any version of Shakespeare's play was on St. Stephen's Day in 1606. -
Antony and Cleopatra was first performed by the King's Men, at either the Blackfriars Theatre or the Globe Theatre in around 1607. -
After 1610, Shakespeare wrote fewer plays, and none are attributed to him after 1613.
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At age 49 (around 1613), he retired to Stratford-upon-Avon, before the Globe Theatre burned down during the performance of Henry VIII on 29th June. -
Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616, at the age of 52. -
Shakespeare's Globe is a reconstruction of the Globe Theatre, an Elizabethan playhouse for which William Shakespeare wrote his plays, on the south bank of the River Thames.
This modern reconstruction was opened in 1997 near the site of the original theatre.