Shakespeare's Kings: The Normans in Sicily Volume II - Softcover

Nowhere will you find an account more lucid than this one. He deals equably and intelligently with several generations of very rich, greedy, bloodthirsty aristocratic bullies, filling the pages with ruthless treacheries, beheaded corpses, indiscriminate slaughters and obscene dynastic marriages . . . The whole book is generously conceived. (Frank Kermode Sunday Times)

Gripping . . . a most valuable compendium of information. (Jonathan Bate Spectator)

This is a continuously absorbing book, which manages the interplay between history and Shakespeare's drama in a skillful and assured way. (Frank McLynn Literary Review)

In a sparkling, fast-paced narrative, Shakespeare's Kings chronicles the turbulent events that inspired Shakespeare's history plays, from Edward III to Richard III. In a time of uncertainty and incessant warfare - when the crown was constantly contested, alliances were made and broken, and the people rose up in revolt - this was the raw material that inspired Shakespeare's dramas. But what really happened between 1337 and 1485? Where did history stop and drama begin? John Julius Norwich establishes just how real Shakespeare's characters and events are and what liberties he took with the facts to entertain his audience. Shakespeare's Kings is an illuminating companion to history and to the richness of Shakespeare's imagination, with a body of work which still shapes our view of the past today.