William Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564. He was baptized on April 24, 1564, in Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warwickshire. He was the third of eight children born to John Shakespeare and Mary Arden. John was a well-known merchant and Mary was the daughter of a Roman Catholic member of the gentry. Shakespeare was educated at the local grammar school. According to history, Shakespeare was the eldest son, and he should have been the apprentice to his father’s shop so that he could be taught everything his father knew and soon take over the business. But instead he became the apprentice of a butcher because of his father’s business was experiencing financial difficulties. There is also another account which holds that Shakespeare became a schoolmaster.

Shakespeare was allowed a lot of free time when he was young. This was suggested by historians that his plays show more ideas of hunting and hawking than do those of other playwrights. In 1582 he married Anne Hathaway, the daughter of a farmer. He was thought to have left Stratford-Upon-Avon after he was caught poaching in the deer park of Sir Thomas Lucy who was a local justice of the peace. Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway had a daughter in 1583 and a pair of twins-a boy and a girl-in 1585. The boy, however, died in infancy.

Shakespeare apparently arrived in London around 1588and by 1592 had gained success as an actor and playwright. Shortly after that, he secured the business of Henry Wriothesley, the third Earl of Southampton. The publication of Shakespeare’s two poems Venus and Adonis in 1593 and The rape of Lucrece in 1594 and some of his Sonnets in 1609, established a reputation for him as a talented and popular Renaissance poet. The Sonnets describe the devotion of a character to a young man whose beauty and charm he praises and to a mysterious and untrue woman with whom the poet is afraid. The ensuing love triangle, resulting from the attraction of the poet’s friend to the woman, is treated with passionate intensity and psychologist insight.

Shakespeare’s professional life in London was marked by a number of financially beneficial arrangements that allowed him to share in the profits of his acting company. The Chamberlain’s Men, later called the King’s Men. The acting company had two theatres, the Globe Theatre and the Blackfriars. His plays were given special presentation at the courts of Queen Elizabeth 1 and King James 1 more frequently than those of his contemporaries.

After1608, Shakespeare’s dramatic production lessened and it seemed that he spent more time in Stratford-Upon-Avon. There he had a secure family in a wealthy house called New Place. Shakespeare had become a leading local citizen. He died on April 23,1616 and was buried in the Stratford church.

Today, Shakespeare is considered the greatest dramatist the world has ever known and the finest poet who has written in the English Language. Almost all higher learning institutions throughout the world require the study of Shakespearean works as part of their English courses. But Shakespeare himself would have dreamt little that one day he would become world famous for the 38 plays and 154 sonnets he wrote, for he received little acknowledgement for his works during his own lifetime.