Product Description

Young William Shakespeare should be taking his glove-making apprenticeship much more seriously. However, carousing with his friends, carrying on with women, and sneaking off to see plays are all higher priorities for him. All this changes when Will's best friend, Richard, asks him to write and deliver sonnets to a young woman, pretending the love poems are from Richard. Once Will lays eyes on the exquisitely beautiful Anne Whateley, he is deeply in love. He wants more than anything to make himself into a man worthy of such a young woman. But entanglements with a certain Anne Hathaway, the discovery of an old prank, and his distracted nature all complicate matters for the future Bard of Avon. In this highly entertaining historical novel Laurie Lawlor imagines how there came to be two different marriage license applications taken out on consecutive dates in November of 1582 between eighteen-year-old William Shakespeare and two different women both named Anne.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1782480 in Books
• Published on: 2006-07-31
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 278 pages

From School Library Journal
Grade 9 Up–Lawlor bases her story of the Bard's early life on an enigmatic historical snippet. She introduces readers to a rebellious, ale-loving 18-year-old who likes nothing better than wooing women and taking part in pranks that subvert both the law and his parents' wishes. However, when Will's best friend, Richard, begs him to write love sonnets so that he might capture the heart of beautiful Anne Whateley, Shakespeare finds that he, too, is completely smitten, and he vows to rectify his ways in order to win her love for himself. Old habits, of course, die hard, and, though mesmerized by the charms of the virginal Anne, he cannot resist the sexual thrills he finds with Anne Hathaway–a woman eight years his senior. Torn between love and lust, Will eventually decides to wed Anne Whateley and applies for a marriage license to do so. His plans are foiled, however, when Mistress Hathaway's pregnancy becomes known, and Will is made to marry the woman who will bear his child. The rest of the poet's tale–going to London, writing for the theater, and becoming the greatest English playwright of all time–is also well documented. The well-written chapters overflow with interesting and accurate details of Elizabethan life. Much is made of Shakespeare's parents' circumventing the religious laws of the times by secretly practicing the Old (Catholic) Faith, as well as of the difference in gender expectations for children in Elizabethan households. The book is a thoughtful and generally plausible attempt at explaining an unknown part of Shakespeare's life.–Nancy Menaldi-Scanlan, LaSalle Academy, Providence, RI
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Gr. 8-11. The still-unexplained existence of marriage-license applications made out on consecutive days for Shakespeare and two different women makes a promising historical tidbit for any storyteller. Lawlor makes good on that promise, portraying 18-year-old Will as a restless but well-meaning wastrel with a gift for words, raging hormones, remarkably poor judgment, and the attention span of a flea. In a plot reminiscent of the comedies Shakespeare would later write, Will finds himself secretly mooning over beautiful, pious Anne Whateley by day even as he sneaks off for assignations with the older seductress Anne Hathaway by night--until, in a decidedly unplanned turn of events, the second Anne's pregnancy brings an abrupt end to his bachelor days. Quoting lines from Shakespeare's sonnets and highlighting the dismal treatment of women in that brutally repressive society, the author creates both a vivid setting and a feckless protagonist, equally credible as an adolescent and as a product of his times. John Peters
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author
Laurie Lawlor grew up in a family enamored with the theater. Along with her five brothers and sisters she spent summers in a summer stock repertory company in a small mountain town in Colorado that was run by their mother (costumer, cook, accountant, and resident psychiatrist) and their father (artistic director). Coming from a theatrical family with a highly developed imagination gave Lawlor some advantages. She soon learned that if she wanted some peace and quiet, she could simply invent terrifying stories bout characters who happened to inhabit the family's home. In this way Lawlor was able to convince her gullible younger brothers and sisters to stay out of the attic or suffer the wrath of Evil Pan. In this clever way Lawlor acquired her first studio. There she was able to write and read and "nobody," she says, "dared bother me." It was when Lawlor was in about the third grade that she decided to become a writer. That was when she made the amazing discovery that she did not have to tell these scary stories over and over again. She could simply write them down. Her best friend in third grade, who was an excellent artist, illustrated the books she wrote. They had such a good time creating the books that they decided to work together, making books, when they grew up. Unfortunately, Laurie's friend became a dental hygienist, Laurie, however, trained as a journalist and then went on to write books. Laurie worked on the high school newspaper and eventually went to journalism school at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. She worked for many years as a freelance writer and editor before devoting herself on a more full-time basis to the creation of fiction and nonfiction for children and young adults. She teaches writing workshops to elementary and junior high school students throughout the country as an artist-in-residence. She is a part-time faculty member of Chicago's Columbia College, where she teaches writing to undergraduates and graduates students, and facilitates teacher workshops. More than thirty of her books have been published and more are forthcoming. Her books have received numerous nominations for state awards. Laurie Lawlor lives in Evanston, Illinois with her husband, Labrador retriever, two parakeets, and a very ancient goldfish. Her two children are grown.

Customer Reviews

Courtesy of Teens Read Too
Meet Will Shakespeare, a lazy, boozing, promiscuous teenager from Stratford-upon-Avon. When he isn't busy avoiding work in his father's glove shop, or sneaking off with the local barmaid, he's finding a way to obtain admittance into the frivolous plays that his town's clergy condemns. The fanciful dialogue greatly inspires Will, and when his friend, Richard, asks him to help compose some verses for his beloved, Will gladly obliges.

Aided by his ambitious sister, Will begins to write enchanted poems that slowly melt the heart of Anne Whately, Richard's love interest. However, as William delivers the poems to Anne, he finds that he, too, is in love with the righteous Anne. He vows to change his life, abstain from drinking and carousing, and work honestly in his father's shop.

But a trip to the intriguing Anne Hathaway threatens to jeopardize his new way of life. Can Will manage to stay true to his ways, or will cunning Anne Hathaway lure him away from the lovely Anne Whately? And will Will ever adjust to the glove-making business, or is something grander beginning to surface on the horizon?

THE TWO LOVES OF WILL SHAKESPEARE is an entertaining novel that embellishes on the two marriage records historians have found that belonged to William Shakespeare. While the story line is fiction, the atmosphere of 16th-century England is brought alive through the allusions of the time period's culture and the religious turmoil that took place. I recommend this book to readers who enjoy learning about the Elizabethan period; however, a reader should not look at it as a biography of William Shakespeare.

Reviewed by: Emylee