'Enjoyable, lively such a pleasure to read renders the drama of Shakespeare s contemporaries more than fringe entertainment Independent Shakespeare is one of the greatest of all English figures, considered a genius for all time. Yet as this enthralling book shows, he was at heart a man of the theatre, one among a community of artists in the teeming world of Renaissance London from the enigmatic spy Christopher Marlowe to the self-aggrandizing Ben Jonson, from the actor Richard Burbage to the brilliant Thomas Middleton. By bringing Shakespeare s contemporaries to life, Shakespeare & Co throws fresh new light on the man himself. Warm, cheerful, generous Wells sketches a whole gallery of Shakespeare s fellow playwrights He brings each vividly to life, making you feel that you ve met them personally in some Blackfriars tavern Simon Callow It was a time and place teeming with excitement, anecdote and incident, and Wells, in this richly enjoyable work, brings it to life with a novelist s sense of the telling detail Dominic Dromgoole Enthralling Observer This is one of the most sane and exciting books on Shakespeare I have read for a long time Scotland on Sunday
