Hamnet
By Maggie O'Farrell
Why this book?
I love anything about Shakespeare. This is the story of William Shakespeare’s only son, Hamnet, who died at the age of 11. Little is known about the boy, but Maggie O’Farrell weaves a moving story out of the bare facts. It is a story about the profound grief and loss shared by Shakespeare and his wife, Ann, whose name is Agnes in this book. She comes to life, too, and O’Farrell gives us a portrait of a marriage like any other where a husband and wife are sometimes at odds, sometimes want different things, but try to understand themselves in their grief. A beautifully written book, too, evoking Stratford-upon-Avon in the sixteenth century.
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