1. In Search of William Shakespeare and The Early Years: 1.Diction: What words does the author choose in chapters one and two? Choose five specific examples: Why did the author choose those particular words? What are the connotations of that word choice? 2.Why does Bryson begin the book with the Richard Plantagenet Temple Nugent Brydges Chandos Grenville? 3.What does Dr. Tarny Cooper say that this image of Shakespeare reveals about the man in the painting?

2. In Search of William Shakespeare and The Early Years: 4. What does Bryson mean, and refer to, when he says: “That wasn’t quite true then and it is even less true now, but it is not all that far from the truth either” (7). 5. What are the three possibilities that Shakespeare scholars are faced with in regards to what is known about the playwright? (15) 6. What is the purpose then of this biography if we know so little?

3. 7. What is the purpose of the introduction to London life in chapter 2? 8. Explain the importance of this statement: “Plague, however, remained the darkest scourge” (24). 9. Why does Bryson discuss Queen Elizabeth and religion? (27) 10. At the end of chapter 2, what are your conclusions about the life of Shakespeare and what is known about him? Site three quotations exemplifying new things you learned about Will.

4. 1.What images does the author use? What does he focus on in a sensory way? Do the kinds of images the author puts in or leaves out reflect his style? Are they vibrant? Prominent? Plain? NOTE: Images differ from detail in the degree to which they appeal to the senses. 2.Explain what effect the first sentence in chapter 3 has on the reader. Why does the author start with this? “Few places in history can have more deadly and desirable at the same time than London in the sixteenth century” (45). 3.How did the Plague affect 16 th century London society? 4.Why does Bryson choose to elaborate so much on the growth of the population and the layout of the city, if this is a biography on Shakespeare? 5.What does he say about the Thames and the venerable bridge?

5. 6. How does the sentence “We don’t know when Shakespeare first came to London” (56) provide a shift in the narration and what is the purpose of this shift? 7. What is a “matter of conjecture” (65)? 8. What did the Dutch tourist do in the Swan Theatre in 1596, and why is this an important event? 9. How do we have our information about theatre life in the Elizabethan era? 10. Explain why Bryson says: “Shakespeare could not have chosen a more propitious moment to come of age” (71). 11. Explain why it was a “time of rapid evolution for theatrical techniques” (76). 12. What happens when Shakespeare enters the Theatrical record? (85).

6. 13. Why is Shakespeare “unusual among the troupe” (95)? 14.What two major arguments surround the beginning of his play writing career? 15.What does Bryson tell us about pronunciations in Shakespeare’s time and ours? (112) 16.What does Bryson tell us about some of the first words found in Shakespeare plays? What reasons does Bryson give for these “new” words? (114) 17.What is particularly poignant about his birth and death records? (116)

7. 1.What details does the author choose to include? What do they imply? What does the author choose to exclude? What are the connotations of his choice of details? PLEASE NOTE: Details are facts; they differ from images in that they don't have a strong sensory appeal. 2.Explain why Bryson says, “not from all perspectives were Elizabeth’s closing years a golden age” (117). 3.Why “for Shakespeare” was there “a particular dimension to the gloom of the decade” (119)? 4.What is “puzzling” about the first “nontheatrical reference to Shakespeare”? (120) 5. How did Shakespeare become involved in “an attempt to overthrow the Queen”? (128)

8. 6. What is odd about the Queen by the winter of 1603? 7. Why does Bryson say that “we might allow ourselves a touch of skepticism” (133)? 8. Why might we re-categorize Shakespeare as a Jacobean playwright rather than an Elizabethan? 9. What, “in some critics’ view” is “the very summit of Shakespeare’s achievement”? (140) and Why? 10. What “has caused trouble for his admirers” about his sonnets? Why do you think this has caused such woe in some of his admirers? (146). 11. The line: “can only be a matter for conjecture” (151) or one like it is written often in this biography. Why?

9. 1.Describe Shakespeare’s life in late March of 1616. 2.Give three reasons why this chapter is aptly titled: Death. 3.What existed of his plays before the First Folio? (159) 4.What are the “typographical curiosities” in the Folio? 5.Why does Bryson devote “a moment to considering how books were put together in the early days of moveable type”? (167) 6.Explain: “At the time of Shakespeare’s death few would have supposed that one day he would be thought the greatest of English playwrights” (170). 7.What does Edmondson say we need to accept “are gone for good”? Why? (180) 8. [Chapter 9]: What claims have been made about “Who Wrote Shakespeare? And what does Bryson conclude about these claimants?