Welcome to the History of English Podcast, a podcast about the history of the English

language.

This is Episode 169, Shakespeare, Documented.

In this episode, we're going to take a close look at the life of William Shakespeare.

He's generally considered to be the greatest poet and writer in the English language,

and his plays are known throughout the world, and that's led to a great deal of interest

in the man behind all of those words.

But the historical record has never been able to satisfy that desire for information.

We actually know relatively little about the man who many call the bard of Aven.

That information gap is led to a great deal of speculation and conjecture, and it's been

the source of endless debates and arguments.

This time, we're going to peel back those layers of conjecture, rumor, and mythology

to determine what we actually know about the man from Stratford upon Aven.

We'll do that by blowing the dust off of old documents to see what those records and

accounts actually say, and along the way we'll try to separate FACT from fiction.

But before we begin, let me remind you that the website for the podcast is historyofenglishpodcast.com,

and you can sign up to support the podcast and get bonus episodes at patreon.com slash

historyofenglish.

Also one other quick note.

I recently spoke with Michael Lavers of the Level Up English podcast about the history

of English, and in a separate interview I spoke with Glenn Spearing of the Ausch

Julian's Teach English podcast about the development of the Australian dialect of English.

...