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Anthony Burgess
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Nothing Like the Sun Paperback – August 5, 2013

by Anthony Burgess (Author)
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 59 ratings
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"Wildly inventive" ―Stephen Greenblatt, author of The Swerve

A magnificent, bawdy telling of Shakespeare’s love life, following young Will’s maturation into sex and writing. A playful romp, it is at the same time a serious look at the forces that midwife art, the effects of time and place, and the ordinariness that is found side by side with the extraordinariness of genius.

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  1. Print length
    284 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    W. W. Norton & Company
  4. Publication date
    August 5, 2013
  5. Dimensions
    5.5 x 0.7 x 8.3 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    9780393346404
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0393346404
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Nothing Like the Sun is a wildly inventive, verbally dazzling attempt to enter the secret chambers of Shakespeare's inner life. Cunning, alert, and deliciously irresponsible, Burgess brilliantly invents a private history of sexual desire and betrayal lurking behind the blank face that looks out from the First Folio."
― Stephen Greenblatt

"Burgess can remake reality not only in his own writing but also in a new perception of the writings of his subject."
― New York Times Book Review

From the Back Cover

'Nothing Like The Sun' is a magnificent, bawdy telling of Shakespeare's love life. Starting with the young Will, the novel is a romp that follows Will's maturation into sex and writing.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0393346404
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Reissue edition (August 5, 2013)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 284 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780393346404
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393346404
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.5 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.7 x 8.3 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 59 ratings

About the author

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Anthony Burgess

Anthony Burgess

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Anthony Burgess (1917-1993) was a novelist, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. He is best known for his novel A Clockwork Orange (1962), but altogether he wrote thirty-three novels, twenty-five works of non-fiction, two volumes of autobiography, three symphonies, more than 250 other musical works, and thousands of essays, articles and reviews.

Burgess was born in Manchester, England and grew up in Harpurhey and Moss Side. He was educated at Xaverian College and Manchester University. He lived in Malaya, Malta, Monaco, Italy and the United States, among other places. His books are still widely read all over the world.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
59 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Davol2449
5.0 out of 5 stars The only novel about Shakespeare that does anything like justice to its subject
Reviewed in the United States on April 30, 2015
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The only novel about Shakespeare that does anything like justice to its subject, because Burgess was one of the great English stylists of the century and he knew that the only way to get to Shakespeare's personality and writing life was by stealing a lot from Shakespeare himself and then letting his quasi-Joycean style take over from there. Remember, though, that this is a novel and makes no bones about being an "accurate" biography. Burgess is extremely fanciful, which makes for a fascinating novel. One of my favorites, which I've read now four times, including the excellently narrated audiobook.
15 people found this helpful
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Joan Rogers
4.0 out of 5 stars A Gorgeously Bedizened Tour de Force
Reviewed in the United States on November 5, 2017
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This book is thrilling for readers who bemoan the increasing simplicity of language favored in modern fiction. When we reduce our prose to something any eight-year-old could understand, we lose much of the precise nuance and shades of color that are the great gifts of our language...we don't have the natural prosody of Italian or Spanish; we lack the exquisite structural evasions that make French so perfect for courtier and diplomat; we cannot create great centipedes of sewn-together meaning like German. But English is an incredibly rich language, a hodgepodge, a portmanteau, a thief and a wily borrower, and with the effortless bravura natural to a linguist and translator of high caliber, Burgess exploits every gift that English offers him, with a dazzling result that is a mosaic composed of everything from diamonds of the first water to thrown-away bits of aluminum foil.

Secondary to this pleasure of language is Burgess' fantastic knowledge of his subject; those educated about the Elizabethan and early Jacobean age, and who have a lot of Shakespeare rolling around in their heads, will be stunned and delighted. The story is, however, a boat swept along on a great tide of language, and if you are sometimes unwilling to be carried along without some idea of where this all is leading, you may find yourself frustrated. Your craft will run awkwardly aground here and there, and although your helmsman navigates adeptly enough, you may be vexed by your own inability to tell a crocodile from a fallen log. Wipe the spray off your compass and put it away; you're along for the ride, and the destination is perhaps less important than your willingness to drown a little.
17 people found this helpful
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Daniel D. Morgan
5.0 out of 5 stars If you only read one Anthony Burgess novel, forget A Clockwork Orange.
Reviewed in the United States on September 4, 2016
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One of the most beautifully written and brilliantly conceived novels I have ever read. An Anthony Burgess tale has never dissapointed me. This book and the Napoleon Symphony are the two most entertaining and inventive works works of historical/biographical fiction since I, Claudius.
14 people found this helpful
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Hilliard Staton
3.0 out of 5 stars Three Stars
Reviewed in the United States on June 13, 2016
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somewhat dusappointing
One person found this helpful
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B. Wilfong
4.0 out of 5 stars “For love is one word but many things.”
Reviewed in the United States on August 18, 2019
Anthony Burgess has written a clever book in “Nothing Like that Sun, a novel that imagines Shakespeare’s love life during his teens and his early years as a young actor and playwright in London. This novel is a wordy, at times poetical, text and one that can require your focus to truly appreciate it. The initial reading is slow going and a little confusing due to Mr. Burgess’ style and word usage. It is not a novel that is easily penetrated (pun totally in line with this text) but then you start working with the style and language and you and the book adapt to each other and the experience flows better.
The text goes from the late 1570s to 1599 (the year Shakespeare’s writing went to a whole other level). A great pleasure in the book are the numerous cleverly inserted allusions to Shakespeare’s work, the Bible, and other writers and writings of the period. They abound in this text, and it is a small joy in and of itself when you catch them.
Mr. Burgess imagines in the book that once Shakespeare moves to London and starts writing that he gets caught up in a love triangle of sorts between the Earl of Southampton (often thought to be the young man addressed in the Sonnets) and an African woman. He gets the impetus for this idea from the Sonnets which are divided between those addressed to a young man and a “dark lady”. It is a clever device and works well, especially for those who have read the sonnets. You will catch quite a few references in this bit.
Other highlights include a chapter where a young Will writes his first sonnet off the cuff while at the family dinner table. It is a great moment depicting the igniting of artistic impulse. Also fun is the depiction of Will and his wife Anne Hathaway’s early sex life. It is the stuff of Elizabethan kink.
As I finished reading “Nothing Like the Sun” I felt it was very Ecclesiastical in nature as the text constantly made me think of that book’s injunction that “all is vanity.” As I read the novel’s epilogue I am not sure that I “get” it, but I think that biblical verse influenced the themes of this text greatly.
Mr. Burgess’s style can make for dense reading, but I enjoyed this story. Those who love Shakespeare, and/or artful renderings of sex, lust, unselfish love and all those conflicting pulls of the heart that make us so wonderfully human will enjoy this book.
One person found this helpful
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Cat lover
5.0 out of 5 stars Only for Shakespeare disciples
Reviewed in the United States on February 11, 2021
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Only for true Shakespeare Disciples!
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Torchy Hunter
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant language, evening you suspect not all the words are real. As satisfy I ng and gorgeous as you might hope for.
Reviewed in the United States on September 30, 2017
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Scholar or newcomer, this book grabs you and you feel every happiness or pain the characters do, whether you intended to or not.
One person found this helpful
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Larry Woiwode
5.0 out of 5 stars Burgess knows Shakespeare deeply enough--his research was in this area ...
Reviewed in the United States on May 16, 2016
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Burgess knows Shakespeare deeply enough--his research was in this area, and destroyed by a bomb in the blitz--to cause you to believe that this is the life WS lived.
4 people found this helpful
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