Book 62 - Robert Nye "Mrs. Shakespeare" (Penguin)

Robert Nye "Mrs. Shakespeare" (Penguin)





Mrs. Shakespeare, now widowed, recollects her one trip to London to visit her famous bard husband- deconstructing the man, the myth, the image. Anne's no poet- she's down-to-earth, unlearned, bawdy, and clever all on her own terms- unveiling a William who is the vain, romantic, dishonest, slippery, posing, fragile man of her love.

Nye manages to create a truly funny heroine and some very laugh out loud moments of the funny kind. Probably interesting to Shakespeare enthusiasts who have pondered his mostly undocumented private and family life. To the rest of us, there's still lots of clever discourse on the relationships between wife and husband & life and art.

Ultimately, however, the story is pretty one-note, and the later third is basically all sexual fetishist category and not particularly interesting to the rest of us, unless you like that kind of thing.

Rye and No Ham

Had to catch a replacement bus from Faversham to Teynham last evening as some poor bugger decided to top him or herself at Teynham station late afternoon., right into a speeding High Speed train. I was coming back from Ashford and missed the last bus towards Sittingbourne and decided to travel the last few miles by train.

I bought some eggs, crumpets and extra mature cheddar cheese from Farmfoods shops in Ashford. Afterwards, I then poked my nose into East Sussex by going to Rye. Bought a few books from a Sue Ryder charity shop.

I love Rye. It is a quaint old cinque port and has that wonderful Grammar School records shop you can spend hours in perusing the old vinyl. This occasion I had no time to take a peek.







The books were -

Margaret Atwood - Poems 1965 - 1975 (Virago)
Henning Mankell - Faceless Killers (Vintage)
Anita Brookner - Hotel Du Lac (Penguin)
John Kenneth Galbraith - The Affluent Society (Penguin)



Wednesday was also the usual mid week gathering at the local pub.