In "What Was Shakespeare Really Like?" Sir Stanley Wells, a leading Shakespearean scholar, dives into some of the most enduring questions about the Bard. Wells seeks to uncover the human behind the literary giant, exploring Shakespeare's thoughts, emotions, and personality through a blend of historical evidence and literary analysis.

Wells addresses four primary questions:
What manner of man was he?
How did Shakespeare write a play?
What do the sonnets tell us about their author?
What made Shakespeare laugh?

Through these lenses, Wells paints a picture of Shakespeare as a multifaceted individual—popular, private, and prone to inner turmoil. The exploration of Shakespeare’s humor and writing process reveals the playwright’s keen understanding of human nature and his ability to tailor roles to the strengths of specific actors.

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the opportunity to review a temporary digital ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.

An interesting and nuanced look at William Shakespeare as a human being and what he might have been like from an expert in the field.

A fascinating and inclusion look into the play wrights life. I thoroughly enjoyed and really liked the way the information was presented.

Getting to know Shakespeare from a more personal perspective was interesting and exactly what I was looking for when I picked up this book. The problem is it didn't really feel like it stayed on topic and other questions were trying to be addressed not just "what was Shakespeare really like?"

I originally requested this because I was working at a Shakespeare company. Unfortunately I'm no longer working there, but I still had to read this bloviating screed. My friend who has a Shakespeare degree from the Shakespeare Institute is not a fan of Wells, and I should've known she was right the second I saw the Branagh pull quote on the back. Wells attempts to build a profile of Willy Shakes by theorizing on his opinions, his writing process, his humor. No disrespect to the nonagenarian who has dedicated his life to this subject, but it read as a pretentious, idolatrous ode to a parasocial relationship with a man who has been dead for 400 years.

Shakespeare will always be in the spotlight of historians, and this book adds another level to consider the famous figure. Rarely do we stop to consider what the personalities of famous historical figures would have been, however there is no better person to answer that question that Stanley Well.s

"What Was Shakespeare Really Like?" by Stanley Wells is a captivating exploration of the Bard's life and identity. Wells masterfully sifts through the historical records and literary clues to unveil the man behind the timeless plays and poems. The book is a scholarly yet accessible analysis that separates the fact from fiction, delving into Shakespeare's family, career, and influences. Wells weaves a rich narrative, shedding light on the enigmatic playwright. His meticulous research and engaging prose make this a compelling read for anyone curious about the true nature of the world's greatest dramatist.

Sir Stanley Wells has been writing about Shakespeare for much of his 93 years on the planet, and I've always enjoyed the way he is able to communicate his passion for the subject at various levels - to advanced scholars, students of all ages, and the general public. He is one of the all-time great editors and scholars in the field of Shakespeare Studies, and his latest book, What Was Shakespeare Really Like?, is based on some of his popular lectures.

Here we get four chapters, each headed by a question about Shakespeare's true self, that are a bit more personal than many other Shakespeare books without being an in-depth biological study:
*What Manner of Man Was He?
*How Did Shakespeare Write a Play?
*What Do the Sonnets Tell Us about Their Author?
*What Made Shakespeare Laugh?

I especially enjoyed the chapter on the sonnets, where Wells gives a great summary of what we know and what we don't know about how they came to be published. He also does a quick and dirty exegesis of some of the most controversial sonnets in the sequence. Each chapter gets to the point quickly and doesn't lean too hard on the speculation that scholars are often left with, due to the limited certainty we have about many aspects of Shakespeare's life and relationships.

The poignant epilogue here sees Sir Stanley revisit his entire career, express appreciation for his many mentors and collaborators, and seem to say a fond farewell to the world of Shakespeare studies.

This is a very accessible and readable book for general audiences, and I'd definitely recommend it for public library collections.

I learned a lot about the human being called William Shakespeare, how he lived and a lot of other information.
It's a fascinating book, well written and engrossing.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Stanley Wells is one of the world’s premier Shakespearean scholars, with, as he discusses in his epilogue, more than 80 years of experience of studying, teaching, reading, and watching Shakespeare. His newest book is an exploration of the man: What Was Shakespeare Really Like? (Cambridge University Press, September 2023). He writes about Shakespeare by considering the historical facts that are known, as well as the assumptions that can be made based on the sonnets and plays he wrote.


When I was an English major, I loved interpreting literature from a variety of perspectives. That’s why a book like this so deeply appeals to me. Wells’s combination of analyzing Shakespeare personality from the perspective of the author’s life as well as the writing itself was fascinating. He highlights that Shakespeare’s writing shows his flexibility with change and improvisation, as well as his meticulous ability to develop an elaborate plot and characters. He has an broad range of writing talent, and it clearly has developed as he gained experience. He was a polyglot and he was familiar with unique places in the world. He could write with a slapstick sense of humor, hoping to please his patrons and viewers, but his preferred humor was likely more specific for everyday life. Further, although it’s clear Shakespeare was driven by an internal compulsion to write.

It has been a long time since Shakespeare was alive, and so much about life in his era and about his life specifically has been lost. But much can be insinuated based on the facts we do know and the memorable words he created within his lifetime. Wells provides four main questions he hoped to answer as he reviewed the historical facts from Shakespeare’s life as well as the details found in his plays and poems.

What manner of man was he?
How did Shakespeare write a play?
What do the sonnets tell us about the author?
What made Shakespeare laugh?

With an epilogue about his own history of Shakespearean study, Wells ties together his commentary with the conclusion that Shakespeare, despite his well-renown in his day and ours, was a “private man.” The bottom line is that Shakespeare’s writing is still universal today because he was so “deeply immerse in the life of his time, so vulnerable to temptation and open experience.” After reading Well’s reviews of Shakespeare and his plays, I too feel a desire to recognize this universality of experience as I revisit the man’s created worlds.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance review copy of this book provided by the publisher via NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This book delves into the enduring mysteries surrounding Shakespeare's life and creative genius, engaging with questions that have captivated readers for centuries. It explores enigmas about his relationships, lifestyle, and literary craftsmanship in order to illuminate Shakespeare's essence and unveil the man behind his masterful works.

With a strong reliance on the text of Shakespeare's works, this book combines history and supposition to paint a picture of what Shakespeare's life might have been like. Unfortunately, the author's position that Shakespeare's sonnets were autobiographical tainted this otherwise useful book. This assertion is baffling and demonstrates a profound ignorance of how the creative process works. Is it possible that the sonnets are autobiographical? Sure. There's nothing implausible about the idea that a man who worked in the theater and spent much of his time away from home might have engaged in extramarital affairs with both men and women. But to suggest that the sonnets are evidence of such affairs is nonsensical. Shakespeare's literary imagination far exceeded his personal experience. Ultimately, Shakespeare's personal life is mostly unknown and unknowable, and the author of this book is grasping at straws in an attempt to prove otherwise.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

For his ninetieth birthday, Sir Stanley Wells, considered one of the world’s greatest authorities on William Shakespeare, was asked to deliver four lectures to answer the following questions:

What was Shakespeare like?

How did he write his plays?

What does the body of his work tell us about his personality?

What made him laugh?

The pandemic having prevented him from delivering the lectures in person, he presented them online instead, and at age 93, has now gathered them together in What Was Shakespeare Really Like? (Cambridge University Press, 159 pages.)

It is a very brief book (a quarter of which is taken up with a long Epilogue that recounts Wells’ eight decades of personal, professional and scholarly involvement with all things Shakespearean.) It is also inconclusive. How could it not be? William Shakespeare, unlike other historic figures, didn’t write about himself in intimate letters or private diaries.

But his contemporaries did write about him. And there is a public record. There are also clues in his plays and poems.

Wells roots his picture of the playwright and poet in evidence and logic, and he’s too erudite to be anything but modest in his conjectures – which is much the appeal of this book.

What was Shakespeare like? William Shakespeare was popular, prosperous, respectable and well-liked by those who knew him, but he was also very private, and his works “surely reflect a life of inner turmoil.”

How did he write his plays? He was an assiduous reader, and took all his plots from various works of literature, both ancient and contemporary. “In some plays, such as Henry V and Antony and Cleopatra, it’s clear that he had a big book – Holinshed’s Chronicles, Plutarch’s Lives – open before him as he wrote.”

Shakespeare wrote his plays to be performed not to be published; only half were during his lifetime, and he apparently had no involvement in their publication.

He wrote his plays with individual actors in mind for specific roles. “He knew his colleagues’ strengths and their limitations. “ For Richard Burbage, his leading actor and co-founder in 1594 of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men theater company, he wrote Romeo when Burbage was 27 , then Hamlet when Burbage was 33; and, as Burbage grew older, “Shakespeare provided for him star roles that did not require him to appear youthful.” None of the parts Burbage played required that he sing — because he was a lousy singer.

“Though he displays great confidence in the staying power of his leading players he learned to be considerate to them too – whereas Richard III has little respite during the course of his play, the heroes of later plays such as Hamlet, Macbeth, and Lear all have time off in their plays’ later stages for a rest – or even a short nap – to help them to summon up strength to play their closing scenes.”

What does the body of his work tell us about his personality? Shakespeare’s personality – by which Wells especially means his private life — is more likely to be revealed in his 154 sonnets rather than his plays, Wells argues, because the poems were written in the first person. Most likely, that is, IF they are autobiographical. That’s a big if; we don’t know that they were.

If they were – and Wells spends time explaining why he thinks that some were – they reveal that Shakespeare was “at various times of his life caught up in emotional and sexual entanglements with more than one male.” In Sonnet 144, for example, Shakespeare writes of “two loves I have of comfort and despair” – which Wells interprets as the poet having two lovers, a handsome man with the personality of an angel and a devilish but sexually enticing woman. “If we read this poem autobiographically then we must unequivocally regard Shakespeare as both heterosexually adulterous and bisexual.”

What made him laugh? Shakespeare was fond of puns and wordplay. He used anecdotes delivered by his characters to reveal — in their garrulousness, or lack of self-awareness, or super self-awareness – how comic they are. He put his characters in situations of “contrived discomfiture” or in which they are tricked into making fools of themselves such as in “Twelfth Night” when Malvolio is fooled into thinking that Countess Olivia is in love with him. He often has a witty character deflate a pompous one. Wells calls Hamlet “the most comic of the tragedies” with the title character using his ”mordant wit to pierce through the bland compromises of Claudius, to diffuse Polonius’s sycophancy, and to satirize Osric’s affectations….”

“What Was Shakespeare Really Like?” is a fun and sometimes fascinating exercise, but, as its author tacitly acknowledges, not a vital one. The important question about Shakespeare is: “What is it that makes so many people think of Shakespeare as the greatest of writers?” And that question has an answer — his craftsmanship, his powers of linguistic expression, his ability to give voice to a wide range of characters, his understanding of human nature.

“We can hope best to know and understand him not through an account of the material facts of his life,” Well writes, “but through the writings, which record an imaginative and spiritual journey more vividly and profoundly than those of any other writer.

This was very dry. The inclusion of quotes from Shakespeare's works every few sentences got old after awhile. I realize that it helps to illustrate the point and the guy knows his Shakespeare works, but it took me out of the book. The most successful parts were when the author gave us some sense of what it was like to be a playwrite during the Elizabethan era. The types of constaints Shakespeare worked under and how his personal writing (sonnets) differed from his professional writing. I feel like I know Shakespeare a little better, but the retrod of his work in the book was too much.

I would have loved to hear Stanley Wells read this as it was originally intended because it felt dense in parts as a written text. I did appreciate Wells' take on Shakespeare's sense of humor, though, and his analysis of his love poems was an entertaining read--reminded me of the more fun parts of grad school.

This compact volume may well be the last book-length commentary from 93 year-old Shakespeare expert Stanley Wells. It's a delightful excursion into key areas of the Bard's life and literary/dramatic legacy. Wells is probably the most prolific editor of the plays and sonnets of the last 35 years; so former English majors should recognize his name (at least). Shakespeare scholars should know him not just from his writings but from his long association with the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford.
Wells tackles four broad topics here. The first, his most broadly informative, considers Shakespeare the man, notably the bifurcation of his identity--London-based actor-playwright and prosperous citizen and landowner in the country. The second section addresses the way he built his plays, taking into account the circumstances and make-up of his theatrical company. Section Three addresses the sonnets, and Four his sense of humor.
All in all this is a great overview for anyone with a reasonable familiarity with Shakespeare's plays and a great refresher for serious readers who have been away from them for a while.

3.5 stars

Sir Stanley Wells has spent his entire professional life knee deep in Shakespeare in one way or another. This short book provides a brief overview of Shakespeare the man and the playwright. I didn't find anything especially new here, but it was an interesting read, nevertheless. He has opinions about the Bard that other scholars don't share, but since there is so little first-hand information about the man himself, most of what is written about him is opinion and conjecture, so the title is a little misleading. Without some great discovery such as a diary or something that has remained hidden for four hundred years, I'm not sure that we will ever know what William Shakespeare was <i>really</i> like.

Even though this book is pretty short, it took me a month to get through it as I didn't find it compelling enough to want to pick it up every evening.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the advanced reader copy.

#WhatwasShakespeareReallyLike #NetGalley

In Sir Stanley Wells, you could not find a better author for this short but excellent book. His decades of leadership in Shakespeare studies form the basis of a convincing analysis of the Bard's life, craft and personality. There are also interesting illustrations, including 'The Cobbe Portrait' that Sir Stanley believes to be the true likeness.

The book's third chapter focuses on the sonnets, which Sir Stanley believes to be most revealing of Shakespeare's private life. He says:
“…they suggest that, even when he was asserting bourgeois respectability with his rising social status in Stratford and his artistic success in London, he was experiencing an inner life of at least intermittent emotional turmoil and sexual tension which found release in poetic composition.”
The plays, meanwhile, show what Shakespeare fans probably enjoy most: “ever-deepening levels of engagement with the most fundamental concerns of the human condition.” Taken together with comments by contemporaries, a portrait is produced of a “hard-working” man who has achieved artistic immortality.

The book will be very valuable not only to students of English Literature, but also to anyone who seeks to understand Shakespeare the man.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has ever wondered about just who William Shakespeare was. The author has presented a short, concise, and informative look into Shakespeare. Easily readable, full of fun facts, I was left with the feeling that I had somehow had a magical portal into Shakespeare's mind. I ended up wondering why, in all my years of education, didn't any of my instructors teach any of this? It would have made reading Shakespeare's writings so much more enjoyable. Perhaps if there are any teachers reading this review, they could assign this book alongside their discussions of Shakespeare.

Wells presents interesting ideas about one of the most famous playwrights of all time. Based on years of scholarly research. Wells works to humanize a mythic entity. He acknowledges little is known about Shakespeare’s life, but he gleans his perceptions from the poet’s work. He points to sonnets or scenes from the plays to justify his believes. He also pulls information about Shakespeare from his peers and colleagues. The chapter about his sonnets is engaging and shows a progression of growth from Shakespeare as he matured. Additionally, the chapter about Shakespeare’s humor paints the playwright as an intentionally cheeky fellow. Fortunately, Wells considers his audience, and we are not presented with a high-brow look at Shakespeare. Wells endures that his book is accessible to a broad audience.

I don't plan to review this book, although I enjoyed reading it. There are some fascinating stories on the pages but too few, I feel.