Wherever we go today, we just can’t seem to get away from him. He is in movies, in the theater, even on TV. Whether modernized or back in Elizabethan times, his influence is everywhere in the things we use for our entertainment. We think we know who he really was and what his life was all about. He almost seems immortal in our eyes. Who was William Shakespeare? Who was this man we still have placed on a pedestal almost four thousand years after he lived? Was he really the man that Hollywood glamorized? Shakespeare’s life, work and controversies come together to form our beliefs of who this great writer really is. William Shakespeare is clouded with mystery. He was born in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England in 1564. “Although his exact birth date is not know, there is a record of his baptism on April 26, 1954” (Kay 13). “His date of birth would have fallen shortly before that day is traditionally considered to be April 23, 1954” (Campbell and Quinn 755). He was born to John Shakespeare and his wife, Mary Arden and was the oldest of three sons. He also had four sisters. “Little is known of Shakespeare’s early life, although it is likely that he received an education at the good local grammar school” (Lawall 2110). Other than that, there really is not much known about Shakespeare’s youth. The next concrete piece of evidence about Shakespeare’s life is his marriage to Anne Hathaway in November 1582, when he was just eighteen years old. It was a marriage of inconvenience. Anne was eight years older than he was and pregnant at the time so they had no choice but to marry. Their first daughter, Susanna, was born in 1583 and twins Hamnet and Judith were born in 1585. Shakespeare is said to have felt trapped by this marriage. Soon after he left for London. That is where he stayed until he returned to Stratford in 1610 for the last few years of his li...
