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Shakespeare's Wife

3.3 of 5 stars 3.30 · rating details · 393 ratings · 118 reviews

A polemical, ground-breaking study of Elizabethan England that reclaims Ann Hathaway's rightful place in history.
Little is known about the wife of the world's most famous playwright; a great deal, none of it complimentary, has been assumed. The omission of her name from Shakespeare's will has been interpreted as evidence that she was nothing more than an unfortunate mista...more

Hardcover, 356 pages

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing PLC (first published January 1st 2007)

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Oct 16, 2007 Naomi rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: shakespeare enthusiasts and historical women's study buffs

Shelves: мозговая-власть

I am always surprised by Greer's actual writing. Her public persona is so contentious and brash. Previous to this book I had only read Greer's feminist writing (i.e. 'female eunich' and 'the whole woman'). Particularly in this book, she has a very measured and well supported style that weaves a cross stitch of fact and speculation into an enjoyable tale. She makes sure that the reader knows when she is fictionalising. Her main argument is that in the absence of documentary evidence why are Shake...more I am always surprised by Greer's actual writing. Her public persona is so contentious and brash. Previous to this book I had only read Greer's feminist writing (i.e. 'female eunich' and 'the whole woman'). Particularly in this book, she has a very measured and well supported style that weaves a cross stitch of fact and speculation into an enjoyable tale. She makes sure that the reader knows when she is fictionalising. Her main argument is that in the absence of documentary evidence why are Shakespearean scholars so willing to believe that Ann Hathaway/Shakespeare was a viper tongued, ugly, unlovable woman who Shakespeare couldn't wait to abandon after having been prodded to the alter at the end of a shotgun? In the process of making sense of what documents that do survive from the late 16th century on William and Ann themselves and using other sources unconnected to the Shakespeares, she covers a very interesting period in the economic and spiritual life of the family in Stradford. I enjoyed particularly Greer's analysis of what activities a housewife would be engaged in both in terms of keeping home and hearth but also in contributing to the family income as well. In terms of an analysis of academic prejudice Greer manages to get the reader thinking once again about what kind of woman Ann Shakespeare might have been and assessing our own social moors.

To quote the last paragraph in the book... 'all this, in common with most of this book, is heresy, and probably neither truer nor less true than the accepted prejudice. Ann Shakespeare cannot sensibly be written out of her husband's life if only because he himself was so aware of marriage as a challenging way of life... The Shakespeare wallahs have succeeded in creating a Bard in their own likeness, that is to say, incapable of relating to women, and have then vilified the one woman who remained true to him all his life, in order to exonerate him. There can be no doubt that Shakespeae neglected his wife, embarrassed her and even humiliated her, but attempting to justify his behaviour by vilifying her is puerile. The defenders of Ann Hathaway are usually derided as sentimental when they are trying to simply be fair. It is a more insidious variety of sentimentality that wants to believe that women who are ill treated must have brought it upon themselves. The creator of Hero, Desdemona, Imogen and Hermione knew better. Ann might say like Lady Macduff: I have done no harm. But I remember now I am in his earthly world, where to do harm is often laudable, to do good sometime accounted dangerous folly. Why then, alas, do I put up that womanly defence to say I have done no harm? (IV. ii. 75-80)'.

A satisfying conclusion to a satisfying book.(less)

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Sep 09, 2012 Cece marked it as gave-up-life-is-too-short

I admit that I only lasted about 50 pages, but when it appears an author has taken every theory going,loaded them in a shaker, given them a good tumble then poured them out and published as they fell, I lose patience quickly. Too many "she might have beens" and "she probablys" all mixed together, along with finger-shaking at previous Shakepeare scholars for treating Anne (or Ann, or Agnes) so unfairly. I am aware that little real evidence exists. I know that Greer is known for impeccable researc...more

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Mar 20, 2009 Steven rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, biography

When I was in college, I was fortunate to spend a semester abroad in London. On one of our trips around the U.K., we spent a weekend at Stratford. I remember being impressed by Shakespeare's birthplace and seeing Jonathan Pryce in Hamlet, but my favorite part of the trip was a visit to Ann Hathaway's cottage (which, Greer points out, was never hers). It was a sunny afternoon in fall, and after our tour, we got to roam around the grounds. I remember a lot of windfall apples lying about. I also re...more When I was in college, I was fortunate to spend a semester abroad in London. On one of our trips around the U.K., we spent a weekend at Stratford. I remember being impressed by Shakespeare's birthplace and seeing Jonathan Pryce in Hamlet, but my favorite part of the trip was a visit to Ann Hathaway's cottage (which, Greer points out, was never hers). It was a sunny afternoon in fall, and after our tour, we got to roam around the grounds. I remember a lot of windfall apples lying about. I also remember wondering what it would have been like to grow up in that house.

Greer spends much time ripping apart moldy old assumptions about the relationship between Ann Hathaway and her husband. Many scholars, apparently, assume that Shakespeare spent so much time away from his wife because he couldn't stand her, or because he loved someone else, and Greer asks, "Why would you think that?" She delves into the lives of Ann's neighbors and builds many other possibilities for her -- businesswoman, brewer, lender, landlady, and, just possibly, publisher. Greer is a great champion for this mysterious woman who must have had an influence on some of the greatest writing in our language.

The book is filled with wonderful turns of phrase, some of which I wrote in my progress notes on this book. An example from late in the book: "The idea that she might be entitled to some of the credit for the preservation of her husband's work is apparently too ridiculous to contemplate, which is why we shall now contemplate it." Awesome.

And at the end, she sums things up nicely writing, "All this, in common with most of this book, is heresy, and probably neither truer nor less true than the accepted prejudice. Ann Shakespeare cannot sensibly be written out of her husband's life if only because he himself was so aware of marriage as a challenging way of life, a 'world-without-end bargain'."

I can recommend this book to anyone interested in this shadowy figure or in small-town domestic life during the Elizabethan era.
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Jun 25, 2008 GraceAnne rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What a great read this was. I absolutely love Greer's vivid, sly, and fierce intelligence and her ways of making argument.
Greer takes the same sources that have engendered a vision of Ann Hathaway, Shakespeare's wife, as plain, old, mean, harsh etc. and reinterprets them to their opposite number. There is not much documentation about her, so when that fails Greer tells us, in copious detail, about people like her. For example, she details the ages people in Stratford got married, and to whom, ho...more

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Feb 04, 2009 Lucy Andrews rated it 4 of 5 stars

I was given this book for Xmas -- I can't say it isn't the sort of thing I usually read, because I'll read anything, but nonetheless, I doubt I would have bought it on my own. That said, while this is not a book to read super-attentively, Greer's purpose is to free up moribund and narrow-minded thinking about Shakespeare's personal life. Using source documents from the time and place (Stratford, circa 1600) to paint LIKELY scenarios, from Ann Hathaway's childhood to her death the book is strange...more

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Dec 06, 2009 Charles Matthews rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The little we know for certain about the private life of William Shakespeare could fit in a slender file folder: records of birth and marriage and death, a few other documents mostly pertaining to real estate transactions and some legal matters, some evidence of his work with various theatrical companies, a handful of mentions by his contemporaries, and the like. But we have the plays and poems, too, and from that has been spun the vast web of maybes and perhapses that constitutes Shakespeare bi...more The little we know for certain about the private life of William Shakespeare could fit in a slender file folder: records of birth and marriage and death, a few other documents mostly pertaining to real estate transactions and some legal matters, some evidence of his work with various theatrical companies, a handful of mentions by his contemporaries, and the like. But we have the plays and poems, too, and from that has been spun the vast web of maybes and perhapses that constitutes Shakespeare biography.

We know even less about his wife, Ann (or Anne or even Agnes) Hathaway Shakespeare. We do know that she was born in 1556 and died in 1623 (outliving him by seven years), that they married in 1582, when she was 26 and he was 18, and that their first child, Susanna, was born six months after the wedding. They had two more children, the twins Hamnet and Judith, in 1585. And that’s pretty much it for Ann, except that in his will, Shakespeare left her his “second-best bed.”

But if countless volumes can be got out of the little we know about William’s life, it’s not really surprising that Germaine Greer can get 400 pages out of Ann’s. Greer is best known – at least on this side of the Atlantic – for her 1970 book The Female Eunuch, a key text in the foundation of the women’s movement of the ’70s. British tabloid readers and TV-watchers know Greer as colorful and uninhibited. (The role of the public intellectual in Britain is evidently very different from that of the American equivalent. Greer appeared on a celebrity edition of the British version of “Big Brother.” Try to imagine John Updike on “Survivor.”) But her persona is anything but flamboyant in this new book, which is a sober, fact-laden attempt to figure out what the life of Mrs. Shakespeare must have been like.

This is not to say that Shakespeare’s Wife lacks controversy. Greer’s target is what she sees as the sexism of scholars who assume that Ann was more of an impediment than a helpmeet to Shakespeare. Scholars (mostly male) have conjectured that Shakespeare was trapped in a marriage to a woman he didn’t love. They cite the disparity in ages between William and Ann, the inference that she was pregnant when they wed, their prolonged separation when he went off to London to make it big and apparently left her in Stratford – three days’ journey away – to take care of the kids. And then there’s that dismissive-sounding bequest.

Greer’s chief target is Stephen Greenblatt, whose 2004 Shakespeare biography, Will in the World, was a bestseller. To paint her very different portrait of the Shakespeare marriage, she uses some of Greenblatt’s own history-scouring techniques, digging deep into the minute details of Elizabethan daily life. Maybe Ann wasn’t a conniving hussy who trapped a mere boy into marriage, she proposes. And maybe consummation of the marriage before the wedding ceremony was commonly accepted, maybe they weren’t separated as long or as often as is usually thought, and maybe Shakespeare didn’t leave her much in the will because he didn’t have to – she was already entitled to her share of the estate. She may well have been a capable businesswoman, supporting the family on her own while he was away. And that bed could have had both sentimental and monetary value.

The one thing Greer doesn’t do is rely heavily on the poems and plays for evidence. She does touch lightly on passages in the plays that reinforce evidence she has found elsewhere, and she dismisses the sonnets – with their implications of the poet’s affairs both gay and straight – as mostly conventional, except when she finds evidence of marital affection in them. She doesn’t even expound on marital themes in the plays, such as the jealous husband/innocent wife motif found in tragedy (Othello), comedy (The Merry Wives of Windsor) and romance (A Winter’s Tale).

What she does give us in her account of the life led by women in Elizabethan Stratford-upon-Avon, is sometimes fascinating. And sometimes it’s tedious and tendentious. There’s a long and mostly irrelevant description of what the medical practice of John Hall, the husband of Ann and William’s daughter Susanna, must have been like. And an equally detailed account of the conflict in Stratford over the enclosure of land once held in common, in which Greer suggests Ann and her daughters might have taken part – and then admits “perhaps none of them” did. And there’s a gruesome section on syphilis and its treatment, all in service of the possibility that William might have contracted it in the brothels of London.

The result is a bit of a jumble of a book. There are flashes of insight, and the suggestion that Ann may not have been such a burden to her husband as some have argued is a sensible one. But a barrage of facts about everything from childbirth in Elizabethan times to the making of ale to the price of land doesn’t constitute a full portrait of Shakespeare’s wife, or add very much to our understanding of his art.

In the end, on almost all questions, Greer is content to leave the conclusions up to the reader: “If Ann Shakespeare had both skill and business acumen, she could have become a wealthy woman in her own right. So far we don’t know that she did, but we don’t know that she didn’t either.” That admission, almost an authorial shrug of the shoulders, comes halfway through the book. Which may be as far as some readers get.

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Jun 04, 2010 Amy rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: early-modern, gender-sexuality

Germaine Greer pulls no punches in this book. Unfortunately, what could have been an insightful, balanced, thoughtful work, instead floats the reader through a tide of polemic. Greer makes it very clear that she thinks Stephen Greenblatt and those of his ilk are not only misogynists but bad academics who didn't do their homework and made broad assumptions. OK. But then so does she. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that her tone is at times combative given that Greer is famous for writing the Fem...more

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Dec 11, 2009 Pamela rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The title is misleading because, of course, nothing is known of Ann Hathaway Shakespeare's life; the book has to deal with what IS known of Stratford in that day. So, the title should have been Life in Stratford during Shakespeare's Life. The book is basically what her life could possibly have been like, but she plays a small role even in the book. There is so much research crammed into this book that reading gets very difficult. Every paragraph seems a tangent as the author weaves in other fami...more

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Dec 27, 2012 Dana rated it 2 of 5 stars

Though at parts, I enjoyed Greer's style of disparaging previous historians who have assumed that Shakespeare hated Ann, I also find that Greer did much the same thing, just while being on the side of Ann. She's still assuming, but just in Ann's favour, and that began to rub me the wrong way. It was also very full of figures; I didn't particularly need to know how each widow divvied up her belongings, or how the commons were being encroached on. A brief mention, summary, of what was happening wo...more

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Jan 20, 2009 Yooperprof rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography, britain

"Shakespeare's Wife" by Australian feminist Germaine Greer is a valuable addition to the groaning corpus of Shakespearian. It's assertive, well-researched, and bracing. Greer argues that Ann Hathaway Shakespeare badly needs to be rescued from the neglect and condescension of the Shakespearians, who have refused to give her her due. They've subscribed too easily to the myth that Mrs. Shakespeare was a kind of harpy whom Will was only too glad to escape by making a career for himself on and throug...more

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Jan 13, 2010 Heather rated it 4 of 5 stars

When I picked up this book, I thought that I had never really thought about Ann Hathaway before. As I got deeper into it, I realized that in actuality I had internalized all those ideas of Shakespeare scholars that she was an ugly shrew, that she tricked William Shakespeare into marrying her, that she drove him out of her home and into the arms of prostitutes, etc. etc. etc.

Those types of suppositions have little if any factual basis, and Greer does a good job of examining how and why they came...more

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Dec 03, 2008 Rhonda rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography

THIS--this book--is how you do it: extrapolate a purely speculative yet plausible Life from impeccable research. THIS is also how you point to the overwhelming majority of Shakespeare critics and theorists, and say to your reader, "Well, will you look at that. EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM made the same assumption: that Shakespeare went to London in no small part to escape his much-older wife, who had become a millstone, etc.--on no evidence whatsoever. So how about we take a closer look at the life...more

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Mar 15, 2011 Anne rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

I thought this book was very readable, for such a scholarly work. It was definitely well-researched.

However, I think the author came across as quite arrogant at times, and that turned me off a bit. Also, she assumed those reading it knew quite a bit more about Shakespeare and the work already published about his life than I did. I had to look a lot up. (Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, but a bit more work than I was anticipating getting into when I picked this up to read.)

What I found mo...more

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Dec 21, 2010 Gayla Bassham rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010-reads

I liked this quite a bit. It's true that Greer does the same thing she accuses other scholars of doing: building up a portrait of someone based on assumptions and speculations rather than facts. Yet I think this is her point: whether you think Ann Hathaway was beloved by her husband or the reverse, literate or not, there is as much reason to believe in a good version of her as a bad version. The book is a little long, and Ann sometimes disappears entirely beneath a swarm of detail about other St...more

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Apr 23, 2010 Susan rated it 3 of 5 stars

The fact that very little is known about Shakespeare’s life hasn’t deterred innumerable volumes being written about him. Since even less is known about Ann Hathaway, in this scholarly work Germaine Greer describes the possible lives that she might have led, ranging from desperate housewife to bold entrepreneur, possibly even providing the financing behind the publication of his plays. In the process, she rebuts the miogyny that has made its way into much of the Shakespeare lore. The book could h...more

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Aug 21, 2008 Kelly rated it 4 of 5 stars

What a complicated but ultimately satisfying read! So little is known about Anne Hathaway, but that didn't stop Greer from poring through thousands of documents to create what Anne's life was probably like -- and help dispel some of the negative history she has been given.

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Jul 09, 2012 Rhonda Keith Stephens rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shakespeare's wife Anne Hathaway has been maligned by biographers who know and can know little about her. Greer makes a good case for a different sort of speculation about the woman, but her presumptions about Hathaway are based on cultural and historical presumptions rather than specific information, which is still lacking. Oddly enough Germaine Greer succumbs to the same fallacy as the Hathaway detractors when she suggests that Shakespeare's mother was not a nice woman, with no more foundation...more

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Sep 17, 2009 EJ Johnson rated it 2 of 5 stars

I think you have to be very familiar with Shakespeare's writing and life to enjoy this book. I am neither. Greer decided to give different side to his life than most historians. Evidently most historians have made up awful ideas of his wife, Greer looks at all the evidence or lack of evidence and twists the view to one of a lovely, capable and loving woman. She is ruthless in attacking others who attacked Ann Hathaway with mean unsupported suppositions. Then she paints a much better picture with...more

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Sep 07, 2012 Wendilyn Emrys rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: history, shakespeare

A innovative study of an interesting subject not properly addressed until now. “Shakespeare’s Wife" is a pragmatic and objective analysis of the extant contemporary material available. This study is not 'sexy' or assumptive, but intelligent and insightful. Not a 'Banbury Tale' to excite Hollywood, but how I would love to see this near to truth story told. For me this 'Hakim's Razor' examination of facts and real evidence is far more interesting than recent fantastical and farcical resurrections...more

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Jun 15, 2009 Lacey N. rated it 4 of 5 stars

Germaine Greer has taken on the "bardolaters" in her exquisitely researched book about Ann Hathaway, Shakespeare's oft mis-represented, wife. Greer counters the frequent theses that Shakespeare hated his wife, that she acting as the older woman seduced him into marriage by pregnancy, and that she was a plain, boring woman with no skills or interests of her own. Greer's meticulous research fails to prove anything definitive about Hathaway and Shakespeare's relationship except that the work of Sha...more

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Aug 11, 2012 Emily rated it 3 of 5 stars

"All this, in common with most of this book, is heresy, and probably neither truer nor less true than the accepted prejudice. Ann Shakespeare cannot sensibly be written out of her husband's life if only because he himself was so aware of marriage as a challenging way life....It is a more insidious variety of sentimentality that wants to believe that women who are ill treated must have brought it upon themselves" (Greer 356). Greer's final paragraph essentially sums up her purpose in writing _Sha...more

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Jul 22, 2011 Maree rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: shakespeare, read-in-2008, library-checkout, tudors

Greer's basic premise is that her speculative bio is just as valid as any of Shakespeare's speculative bios - everyone's working with the same scant documentary evidence, so why not spin a pro-Anne tale? I appreciated the concept, and Greer definitely supports her speculation with evidence from contemporary Stratford. However, the tangents into irrelevant financial minutiae make the book hard to stick with, and the author goes too far in the direction of what she criticizes in other scholars - a...more

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Sep 22, 2009 n* Dalal rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shakespeare's Wife isn't amazing because it's true or easy to read or riveting. Fabulously well-researched and armed with the power to doubt, Germaine Greer sets out with one arched eyebrow to question everything that has previously been surmised about Shakespeare's marriage.

The fact is, we have no idea what Shakespeare's private life was like, what he thought of his wife, how much of his work was imaginative fiction and how much of it was obsequious drivel, written only to maintain patronages....more Shakespeare's Wife isn't amazing because it's true or easy to read or riveting. Fabulously well-researched and armed with the power to doubt, Germaine Greer sets out with one arched eyebrow to question everything that has previously been surmised about Shakespeare's marriage.

The fact is, we have no idea what Shakespeare's private life was like, what he thought of his wife, how much of his work was imaginative fiction and how much of it was obsequious drivel, written only to maintain patronages. But where prior Shakespeare scholars assume a poem or letter's meaning to be one thing, Germaine Greer assumes it means another. She states that because we really know nothing, prior Shakespeare scholars could be wrong, and she also openly acknowledges that because we really don't know anything, everything she posits could be wrong, too.

Shakespeare scholars have spent centuries arguing that Anne Hathaway, being 8 years older than dear Will, ensnared him by forcing her wild libido upon him and getting pregnant, thereby forcing him to marry her. However, Greer pores over birth registers from the 1500's and finds that illegitimate birth was ridiculously common, and plenty of "good women" ended up having bastard children. In fact, leaving Anne to maintain herself and her baby wouldn't have been impossible. Greer follows every assumption made by "Bardolaters" about Anne in this way. They claim she was useless; Greer finds evidence that many of Anne's contemporaries could make malt, sew, knit, milk ewes, make cheese, ale, bread, cream, bacon, cloth, woven goods, and that many of Anne's friends and neighbours were even money-lenders, making 10 per cent annually on their investments. Greer recognises that Anne's neighbours' success doesn't mean Anne had the same success. But it doesn't mean she didn't, either. There's just not much evidence either way. Shakespeare's Wife occasionally shows that more evidence exists to imagine Anne was independent (or helpful, or literate...) than not, but it also shows that there is not any definite conclusive evidence.

In a way, prior Shakespeare scholars have imagined their hero to have been a genius boy, tormented by a cruel old wife, driven to prostitutes by a cold ugly wife; they have imagined Anne to be a conniving woman who, once she'd had her way with dear Will (enough to have twins and another child with him), ended up leading a miserable solitary life. They imagine her entire life after Will was spent in dire poverty, illiterate, unable even to make any sort of use of herself, unaware and unimpressed by her husband's work. They often aim to prove Will's poor behaviour toward his wife is justified by her inelegance, her ugliness, and her general repugnance. Greer proves this story of Anne's life to be pure imagination. And then imagines something else entirely.

She essentially un-interprets the documents that previous scholars have interpreted to Anne's detriment. Will's will has been interpreted to mean that Will intentionally left Anne from his will because he hated her. Greer argues that there are a large number of possessions that aren't mentioned in Will's will, because many things already given would not need mentioning. Importantly missing: his papers. He does bequeath her the bed, and scholars have often said this is a scathing, mean-spirited comment on Anne's infidelity. Greer shows that beds were often bequeathed back then, because they were the most expensive piece of furniture in the house. Also, beds often couldn't be moved, so bequeathing a bed also usually meant the person it was given to couldn't be kicked out of their house. None of this proves Shakespeare did like his wife. It only proves that he might have.

In this way, through careful research and painstaking reinterpretation, Greer imagines for Anne a better life, a life of solid caring and simple honest living. At the end of the book, Greer states her entire book is "probably neither truer nor less true than the accepted prejudice." After all, we don't have proof either way, and this is why the limited information offered to history is infuriating. But she's offered Anne a marriage more like the ones her husband famously wrote about; a marriage where the wife is true to her husband and duties, even if the husband doesn't behave nearly so well.

What I found really brilliant about this analysis was how Greer clarifies the role that wives of public men are written into by "experts." She examines how the wives of men who are successful and well-liked are often painted as conniving and unloving. Think Hilary. The wives of the men we admire can never be worth sharing their beds. When Bill was in office, Hilary was painted as a careering woman; their marriage is regularly presented as the picture of marital strife. But she stayed with him and stood by him through an impeachment over an incident wherein Bill humiliated and betrayed her. Politically, I'm no Hilary fan; I think she's as snakey and weasely as any politician. But the judgement of her behaviour as the wife of another weaselly politician plainly shows how successful men are simply held to a different and lower standard.(less)

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Nov 23, 2008 Louise Chambers rated it 3 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone interested in women's lives in 1500s

Recommended to Louise by: Denver Public Library

Shelves: women-studies, biography

Very informative as to women's lives in Shakespeare's time. Socio-economics of women's lives. This book also helped me to put much of English history of that period into perspective. Although it is a bit difficult to sift through all the details, I would encourage anyone who is interested in history and sociology from the average person's viewpoint to read on, especially as it is so descriptive of women's lives and their relationships to their husbands and families.
Greer makes a strong case for...more

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Apr 13, 2012 Särah Nour rated it 4 of 5 stars

Despite little being known of the Bard’s mysterious wife, over the years she has been much maligned by Shakespearean scholars, who are convinced beyond doubt that she was little more than an untamed shrew and a thorn in the side of their exalted dramatist. Yet noted feminist Germaine Greer, armed with extensive historical records and a keen understanding of the cultural zeitgeist of Elizabethan England, provides a revisionist assessment with Shakespeare’s Wife, a meticulously researched and vivi...more Despite little being known of the Bard’s mysterious wife, over the years she has been much maligned by Shakespearean scholars, who are convinced beyond doubt that she was little more than an untamed shrew and a thorn in the side of their exalted dramatist. Yet noted feminist Germaine Greer, armed with extensive historical records and a keen understanding of the cultural zeitgeist of Elizabethan England, provides a revisionist assessment with Shakespeare’s Wife, a meticulously researched and vividly written show of support for the much misunderstood Ann Hathaway.

The family trees of both Ann and William Shakespeare are thoroughly traced and examined, as are the social mores of Stratford-Upon-Avon during the 16th and 17th centuries, negating the various myths that have surrounded the courtship of eighteen-year-old Will and twenty-seven-year-old Ann. Due to the couple’s age difference, scholars have long speculated that Ann was a manipulative “old maid” who seduced an impressionable young man and ensnared him in a discontented marriage. Historical as well as fictional portrayals of Ann Shakespeare, from Thomas De Quincey’s Shakespeare: A Biography to Anthony Burgess’s Nothing Like the Sun, depict her as homely and opportunistic, even depraved and desperate for a husband. In playing the part of Ann Shakespeare’s advocate, Greer suggests what no scholar has dared contemplate before: that young Will initiated the relationship, wooed the future Mrs. Shakespeare with his poetry, and that love was present in their marriage.

Due to the lack of hard facts regarding both the Bard and his wife, Greer structures her theories based on the social context of their lifetime. For example, while Shakespeare was off in London, Greer believes Ann may have earned wages as a knitter or a spinner, as business in those fields was booming during that era. By the time the Shakespeare family gained money and status, Ann could have very well have taken up brewing ale, another prevalent business venture in that time and place. Greer also provides multiple answers for various questions raised, such as whether Ann could read and write; how she supported their three children while her husband was off in London, pursuing his career; the health and condition of their ill-fated son, Hamnet; and Shakespeare’s reasons for omitting his wife from his will.

Always consistent with her citations of court and tax records, church records, deeds, charters and other such sources, Greer provides ample support for the many theories presented, and in doing so argues a persuasive, compelling and insightful case in Ann Hathaway’s favor. Various excerpts from Shakespeare’s works—both his plays and his poems—are also analyzed for possible clues as to certain aspects of the Bard’s life as well as his marriage.

Shakespeare’s Wife is an ambitious and commendable piece of work; a book of painstaking detail, shrewd commentary, and an eloquent and credible literary voice. Needless to say Germaine Greer has succeeded in righting the wrongs done to the wife of England’s greatest playwright, and lending a voice to one of history’s underdogs.

You can read this and other reviews at my blog: http://zeitgeist-sacha1689.blogspot.com/(less)

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Apr 08, 2009 Nicholas Whyte added it · review of another edition

http://nhw.livejournal.com/1150833.html[return][return]Ann Shakespeare, n

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Jul 13, 2008 Kirsten rated it 3 of 5 stars

This was somewhat uneven. Greer's main goal is to challenge all the scholarly assumptions that have been made about Ann Hathaway over the years: that she seduced Shakespeare, that she trapped him into a loveless marriage, that he ran off to London to get away from her, that she was illiterate and probably had no idea about his work...... She uses a lot of Stratfordian records to show that most of those scenarios were highly unlikely. (For example, if he had absconded to London, it would have bee...more

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Jul 14, 2008 Rebecca rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Shakespeare lovers

4 stars is probably too many...3 stars is probably too few. Like a lot of theatre buffs and Shakespeare fans, I had heard all of the stories about how Shakespeare must not have loved his wife. Germaine Greer does a great job of showing the sometimes subtle and sometimes blatant misogyny that lies underneath a lot of the critics of Ann Hathaway. Of course Greer can't prove that William Shakespeare really loved Ann, or that Ann loved Will -- but she shows how ridiciulous scholars are for trying to...more

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Jul 01, 2008 Ed rated it 3 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Shakespeareans, Hathawayans

Shelves: shakespeariana

The defenders of Ann Hathaway are usually derided as sentimental when they are trying simply to be fair.
Greer shakes a stick at the establishment regarding the oft-denigrated Mistress Hathaway. Greer hath a way of bringing a new twist on the evidence, a rebuttal to the tired and received opinions trotted out on every occasion of Shakespearean biography. Among the highlights for me were the subtle reversal of Willie's mom, Mary Arden, often portrayed as the sweet competent mother, to be somewhat...more

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Jun 03, 2008 Molly rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: People who don't get bored easily and like documentary's

Recommended to Molly by: Ummm No one, my mum just wouldn't let me read 'Russle Brand'!

Shelves: reading-at-the-moment-sorta

Well the thing is i started reading it when i was very bored but didn't wanna go to sleep, but it was soooooo boring that i fell asleep anyway! [It belongs to my mum lol]. It just drones on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on [just skip to the next bit when you get my jist] and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on [are you getting my jist yet?!...more

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About Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer is an Australian born writer, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century.

Greer's ideas have created controversy ever since her ground-breaking The Female Eunuch became an international best-seller in 1970, turning her overnight into a household name and bringing her both adulatio...more

More about Germaine Greer...

Books by Germaine Greer

The Madwoman's Underclothes: Essays and Occasional Writings

The Obstacle Race: The Fortunes of Women Painters and Their Work

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