ECU Libraries Catalog

Shakespeare and the Countess : the battle that gave birth to the Globe / Chris Laoutaris.

Author/creator Laoutaris, Chris author.
Format Book and Print
EditionFirst Pegasus Books hardcover edition.
Publication Info New York, NY : Pegasus Books, 2015.
Copyright Notice ©2014
Descriptionxvi, 502 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, map, portraits ; 24 cm
Subject(s)
Contents A Blackfriars mystery -- An education. A radical beginning ; The female university ; Monstrous regiments ; The ambassador's wife ; A widow's bed -- Parliament woman. The War of Admonition ; Lady Russell ; Meet the neighbours ; The widow and the necromancer -- Turf wars. The Arden Trail ; The Queen's soldier ; Closing ranks ; Sheriff and bailiff of the manor -- The battle for Blackfriars. Building ambitions ; Shakespeare and Essex ; Detective Dowager ; 'my war between mine own flesh and blood' ; Shakespeare's Nemesis ; In the name of love -- The birth of the Globe. Aftermath ; 'this distracted Globe' ; Wedding belles and rebels ; 'I'll be revenged ... ' ; 'from the stage to the State' -- Shakespeare's Countess. The last stand for Donnington ; All's well that ends well -- Afterlife of a murderess.
Abstract "In November 1596, a woman signed a document that would nearly destroy the career of William Shakespeare. Who was this woman who played such an instrumental, yet little known, role in Shakespeare's life? Never far from controversy when she was alive--she sparked numerous riots and indulged in acts of breaking-and-entering, bribery, blackmail, kidnapping and armed combat--Lady Elizabeth Russell, the self-styled Dowager Countess of Bedford, has been edited out of public memory, yet the chain of events she set in motion would make Shakespeare the legendary figure we all know today. Lady Elizabeth Russell's extraordinary life made her one of the most formidable women of the Renaissance. The daughter of King Edward VI's tutor, she blazed a trail across Elizabethan England as an intellectual and radical Protestant. And, in November 1596, she became the leader of a movement aimed at destroying William Shakespeare's theatrical troupe--a plot that resulted in the closure of the Blackfriars Theatre but the construction, instead, of the Globe. Providing new pieces to this puzzle, Chris Laoutaris's rousing history reveals for the first time this startling battle against Shakespeare and the Lord Chamberlain's Men."--Dust jacket.
General noteOriginally published: London : Fig Tree, an imprint of Penguin Books, 2014.
Bibliography noteIncludes bibliographical references (pages 467-482) and index.
ISBN9781605987927
ISBN1605987921

Available Items

Library Location Call Number Status Item Actions
Joyner General Stacks DA358 .R87 L36 2015 ✔ Available Place Hold