William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was an English poet and playwright. He wrote or co-wrote approximately 39 plays and 154 sonnets, as well as a variety of other poems.The exact figures cannot be known. See Shakespearean authorship, Shakespeare's collaborations and Shakespeare Apocrypha for further details.

Plays

Tragedies

+ Shakespeare's plays Title Year written First publications Performances Authorship notes Antony and Cleopatra1601–1608First published in the First FolioBelieved to have been performed between 1606 and 1608. SummaryIn a setting soon after Julius Caesar, Marc Antony is in love with Cleopatra, an Egyptian queen. What used to be a friendship between Emperor Octavius and Antony develops into a hatred as Antony rejects the Emperor's sister, his wife, in favour of Cleopatra. Antony attempts to take the throne from Octavius and fails, while Cleopatra commits suicide. Coriolanus1605–1608 (believed)First published in the First FolioNo recorded performances prior to the Restoration; the first recorded performance involved Nahum Tate's bloody 1682 adaptation at Drury Lane. SummaryThe Roman military leader Caius Martius, after leading Rome to several victories against the Volscians, returns home as a war hero with a new last name, Coriolanus, given for the city of Corioles which he conquered. However, after an attempt at political office turns sour, he is banished from Rome as a traitor. Hungry for revenge, Coriolanus becomes leader of the Volscian army and marches to the gates of Rome. His mother, his wife, and his son, however, beg him to stop his attack. He agrees and makes peace between Romans and Volscians, but is assassinated by enemy Volscians. HamletLikely early 17th centuryFirst published in the so-called "bad" First Quarto, 1603Earliest recorded performance of Hamlet was in June 1602, with Richard Burbage in the title role.Some scholars, such as Peter Alexander and Eric Sams, believe that the oft-attributed source work known as the Ur-Hamlet was actually a first draft of the play, written by Shakespeare himself sometime prior to 1589.* Bloom, Harold,Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human. New York, 1998. SummaryPrince Hamlet is visited by his father's ghost and ordered to avenge his father's murder by killing King Claudius, his uncle. After struggling with several questions, including whether what the ghost said is true and whether it is right for him to take revenge, Hamlet, along with almost all the other major characters, is killed. Julius Caesar 1599F. E. Halliday, Shakespeare Companion, pp. 159, 260, 524, 533. First published in the First Folio Thomas Platter, a Swiss traveller, saw a tragedy about Julius Caesar at a Bankside theatre on 21 September 1599. This was most likely Shakespeare's play. There is no immediately obvious alternative candidate. (While the story of Julius Caesar was dramatised repeatedly in the Elizabethan/Jacobean period, none of the other plays known are as good a match with Platter's description as Shakespeare's play.)Richard Edes's Latin play Caesar Interfectus (1582?) would not qualify. The Admiral's Men had an anonymous Caesar and Pompey in their repertory in 1594–95, and another play, Caesar's Fall, or the Two Shapes, written by Thomas Dekker, Michael Drayton, Thomas Middleton, Anthony Munday, and John Webster, in 1601–02, too late for Platter's reference. Neither play has survived. The anonymous Caesar's Revenge dates to 1606, while George Chapman's Caesar and Pompey dates from . E. K. Chambers, Elizabethan Stage, Vol. 2, p. 179; Vol. 3, pp. 259, 309; Vol. 4, p. 4. SummaryCassius persuades his friend Brutus to join a conspiracy to kill Julius Caesar, whose power seems to be growing too great for Rome's good. After killing Caesar, however, Brutus fails to convince the people that his cause was just. He and Cassius eventually commit suicide as their hope for Rome becomes a lost cause. King Lear 1603–1606Frank Kermode, 'King Lear', The Riverside Shakespeare (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), 1249.R.A. Foakes, ed. King Lear. London: Arden, 1997), 89–90.Published in quarto in 1608First recorded performance: 26 December 1606, before King James I at the Whitehall Palace. SummaryAn aged king divides his kingdom between two of his daughters, Regan and Goneril, and casts the youngest, Cordelia, out of his Kingdom for disloyalty. Eventually he comes to understand that it is Regan and Goneril who are disloyal, but he has already given them the kingdom. He wanders the countryside as a poor man until Cordelia comes with her husband, the King of France, to reclaim her father's lands. Regan and Goneril are defeated, but only after Cordelia has been captured and murdered. King Lear then dies of grief. Macbeth1603–1606A.R. Braunmuller, ed. Macbeth (CUP, 1997), 5–8.First published in the First FolioThere are "fairly clear allusions to the play in 1607."Kermode, Riverside Shakespeare, p. 1308. The earliest account of a performance of the play is April 1611, when Simon Forman recorded seeing it at the Globe Theatre.If, that is, the Forman document is genuine; see the entry on Simon Forman for the question of the authenticity of the Book of Plays.The text of Macbeth which survives has plainly been altered by later hands. Most notable is the inclusion of two songs from Thomas Middleton's play The Witch (1615)Brooke, Nicholas, (ed.) (1998). The Tragedy of Macbeth. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 57. . SummaryMacbeth, a Scottish noble, is urged by his wife to kill King Duncan to take the throne for himself. He covers the king's guards in blood to frame them for the deed, and is appointed King of Scotland. However, people suspect his sudden power, and he finds it necessary to commit more and more murders to maintain power, believing himself invincible so long as he is bloody. Finally, the old king's son Malcolm besieges Macbeth's castle, and Macduff slays Macbeth in armed combat. Othello1602–1604 ()First published in 1622 in quarto format by Thomas Walkley. Included in the First Folio the following year.Probably first performed for King James I at the Whitehall Palace on 1 November 1604. SummaryOthello, a Moor and military general living in Venice, elopes with Desdemona, the daughter of a senator. Later, in Cyprus, he is persuaded by his servant Iago that his wife (Desdemona) is having an affair with Michael Cassio, his lieutenant. Iago's story, however, is a lie. Desdemona and Cassio try to convince Othello of their honesty but are rejected. Pursuing a plan suggested by Iago, Othello sends assassins to attack Cassio, who is wounded, while Othello himself smothers Desdomona in her bed. Iago's plot is revealed too late, and Othello commits suicide. Romeo and Juliet 1595–1596, with a possible early draft written in 1591Draper, John W. "The Date of Romeo and Juliet." The Review of English Studies (Jan 1949) 25.97 pp. 55–57Gibbons, pp. 26–31 First published in 1597 in Q1Halio, Jay. Romeo and Juliet. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1998. p. 1 First performed sometime between 1591 and March 1597Gibbons, Brian. Romeo and Juliet. London: Methuen, 1980. p. 26. SummaryIn Verona, Italy, two families, the Montagues and the Capulets, are in the midst of a bloody feud. Romeo, a Montague, and Juliet, a Capulet, fall in love and struggle to maintain their relationship in the face of familial hatred. After Romeo kills Juliet's cousin Tybalt in a fit of passion, things fall apart. Both lovers eventually commit suicide within minutes of each other, and the feuding families make peace over their recent grief. Timon of AthensFirst published in the First FolioNo recorded performances during Shakespeare's lifetime. An adaptation was staged by Thomas Shadwell in 1678.Brian Vickers and others argue that Timon of Athens was co-written with Thomas Middleton, though some commentators disagree.Vickers, 8; Dominik, 16; Farley-Hills, David (1990). Shakespeare and the Rival Playwrights, 1600–06. Routledge, 171–172. . SummaryTimon of Athens is an apparently wealthy man in his community who freely gives of his abundance to those around him. Eventually, it becomes apparent that he is living on credit, when all of his creditors ask for payment on the same day. Timon asks for his friends to help, but is refused. Angry at mankind's double nature, he leaves the city for the wilderness, and lives in a cave. Despite the efforts of several men to cheer his spirits, he dies full of hatred for humanity. Titus AndronicusProbably late 1593First published in quarto in 1594; the second quarto was published in 1600, the third in 1611.First recorded performance: 24 January 1594 at the Rose; repeat performances on 29 January and 4 February. The play was performed by the Admiral's Men and the Lord Chamberlain's Men later that same year in June 1594 at Newington Butts. There was another performance, probably also by the Lord Chamberlain's Men, on 1 January 1596, in Sir John Harington's household at Burley-on-the-Hill in Rutland.Brian Vickers argues that Titus Andronicus was co-written with George Peele.Vickers, Brian (2002). Shakespeare, Co-Author: A Historical Study of Five Collaborative Plays. Oxford University Press. 8. ; Dillon, Janette (2007). SummaryRoman war hero Titus Andronicus returns victorious in his wars against the Goths. He kills one of the sons of the Queens of the Goths in a revenge ritual, despite her pleadings. When the queen becomes the Empress of Rome, she takes revenge on the house of Andronici for her son's blood. She has her sons rape and mutilate Titus' daughter, Lavinia, over her husband's murdered corpse, then frames Titus' own sons for the murder. Lavinia, however, manages to communicate to her father who the true murderers were, and Andronicus takes revenge, killing the queen and her two sons, but being killed in the act. Troilus and Cressida1602 (believed)1609: two separate editions in quartoThe dates of the play's earliest performances are uncertain due to contradictions in the editions published in 1609. SummaryThe Trojans are under siege by the Grecian army of Agamemnon. Troilus, a Trojan, falls in love with Cressida, a Greek captive. When Cressida is given back to the Greeks as part of a prisoner exchange, Troilus fears that she will fall in love with one of them. His fears prove to be true when he crosses enemy lines during a truce and sees her and a Greek man together.

Comedies