Stanley Wells 
Shakespeare and Co. 
Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Dekker, Ben Jonson, Thomas Middleton, John Fletcher and the Other Players in His Story

”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