Fictional yet believable biography of Shakespeare's private life, written in an Elizabethan style. Once I got into the cadence and tone, it flowed quite beautifully.

Glad I picked this up during a "Shakespeary" time of my life - in the process of reading and watching a succession of his plays. A year ago this book would have been almost totally lost on me.

As it was, there were many quotes, tidbits and references I got, some I understood after looking it up, and many I'm sure went over my head entirely!

This was my first Burgess book, and I'm certainly convinced of his eruditeness.

A rollicking romp through the Bard's love life from his salad days to his last days of illness. Unsparingly bawdy and filled with the kind of puns and literary horseplay you'd expect from the writer of 'wanting seed' and 'clockwork orange'. Also fascinating how he manages to take snippets of Shakespeare's oeuvre and presents a blueprint of their evolution through his thoughts, witty repartee and ruminations. You can even tap your foot to 'em five beats in the lushly evocative prose.

Clever use of language & obvious literary skill. Still, the measure of a book is to entertain & I struggled with this. I freely admit to being a dumbass so let’s just say Burgess’s ability to write exceeds mine to comprehend.

Beautifully written book, I enjoyed reading it, the images and metaphores used throughout the novel were impressice. The book gave an interesting view from the Shakespearean England. I had limited knowledge of Shakespeare's life before, so for me the story was compelling, also Burgess is masterful character creator and he didn't disappoint in this novel either, both WS and WH were expectionally written.

All in all, it was a pleasurable read, would recommend it to those who are looking for something entertaining yet thought provoking.

Shakespeare in Lust.

"Literature is an epiphenomenon of the action of the flesh", so Anthony Burgess' Shakespeare declares. The statement encapsulates the novel. From his youth to his death, Shakespeare is presented as a bawdy, sex-mad boy. His first adventures result in a precocious pregnancy and hasty marriage. Afterwards he absconds from his father's glove-making business to become a Latin schoolmaster in a small home, where in the course of a lesson on Plato, he shocks them with impromptu lessons about Athenian pederasty. Fired soon afterwards, he finds literary patronage with a young court adviser. He writes conventional sonnets, has affairs with men and women, but in the end is more cuckolded against than cuckolding. Burgess' Shakespeare is not a literary savant but a carnal elegist.

While the novel might be about Shakespeare, its style is Joycean. Burgess' prose is abstruse. There are comic malapropisms (Pluto for Plato, syphilys for Sisyphus), homophonous punning ("I feel defiled" and "a field defiled'; "it is a kind of gift of money to spend on one's sins, guilt, gilt, gild, geld"), farcically poetic conceits ("his faced moved towards disintegrating; he cracked the laughter to quiescence"), paradoxical aphorisms ("we are condemned to dying more than death"), and absurd hyperbole ("she grew soft again, saying no more of complaints, glowed in a good-night of pigeon-kisses, waved, turning, walked into the moon"). As a reader of Finnegans Wake, he revels in the richness and nonsense of language. His own Shakespeare is attentive to the euphony of language, the frisson of alliteration and the fun of word-association. It is at times playfully unreadable.

The pulp paperback I've been toting around for decades got soaked. Everyone hates Anne Hathaway.

Egy legendás szerző élete, modern és sodró regénybe komponálva. A mindent átható nyelvezeti önműködés végül legyűri a cselekményt, az embert, és talán az olvasót is.
Töredékes, önellentmondásokba keveredő életrajzi alapanyagból a Shakespeare-i nyelv, vagyis annak 20.-ik századi emulziója, emulációja olyan elemi humorral és szabadossággal csapong, körkörösen és visszatérő beakadásokkal, játékos és mániákus féktelen erotikával, testiséggel és kórsággal, korképpel és Londonnal, politika, irodalom, színház... Az egész világ. Valahogy végigtelik, elrohan WS magánélete ebben a könyvben, és közben ránk marad egy nyelvi alkotmány, és persze a darabok és versek, mintegy melléktermékeként ennek a könyvbeli életnek, mert úgy érezhetjük, kifordítható ez a folyamat.
Nagyot alkotott Burgess, a maga nemében.

It's not often that one encounters a book as profoundly moving and creatively audacious as Anthony Burgess's "Nothing Like the Sun". This fictionalized biography of William Shakespeare is a tour de force that deserves every one of the five stars I'm giving it.

"Nothing Like the Sun" is a daring exploration of the life of the Bard, delving into his relationships, his inspirations, and the turbulent times in which he lived. It portrays Shakespeare as a passionate, flawed, and deeply human figure, bringing to life a man who, for all his literary genius, remains enigmatic and elusive.

Burgess's writing is simply sublime. He adopts a pseudo-Elizabethan prose style that, while challenging at times, is deeply rewarding. It captures the cadence and richness of the language of Shakespeare's time, making the narrative feel authentic and immersive. It's a testament to Burgess's own linguistic prowess and his deep respect for the Bard.

Burgess deftly weaves historical facts with imaginative speculation. He delves into the mysteries surrounding Shakespeare's life, from the identity of the 'Dark Lady' of his sonnets to the causes of his premature death. The result is a narrative that is as engaging as it is enlightening.

Perhaps what impressed me most about "Nothing Like the Sun" was the depth of its characterizations. Burgess's Shakespeare is a complex and deeply flawed figure. He is driven by ambition, haunted by guilt, and tormented by unrequited love. He is at once a literary genius and a man struggling to make sense of his own existence. It's a portrayal that is at once sympathetic and unsparing, and it brings the Bard to life in a way that few other works have managed.

In summary, "Nothing Like the Sun" is a triumph of historical fiction. It is a book that combines deep scholarship with imaginative storytelling, and it offers a fascinating insight into the life of one of history's greatest writers. It's a book that deserves to be read and reread, and for that reason, I'm delighted to give it a full five-star rating.

This is an odd one - a bit like A Clockwork Orange, the narrative style is a bit strange and it took me a while to get my eye/ear in with it. However once I did (& it took around 200 pages, which is most of the book, mind), this is an intriguing reimagining of Shakespeare's love life and the back story to the Dark Lady/youth of Shakespeare's sonnets. Burgess has a great turn of phrase and I read this in pretty much one sitting. It's not the best book I've ever read, but it's okay for passing an afternoon.

I was worried that reading this book without having read a whole hell of a lot of Shakespeare was going to be tantamount to watching a '60s Godard film without having watched a whole hell of a lot of movies: it may be enjoyable but you're gonna miss out on, like, 95% of the in-jokes and references. Sure, I probably didn't catch all (or even 50%) of Burgess's allusions, but I still really dug this book. Fascinating and pretty naughty at times too.

The idea is simple and brilliant at once, but by no means easy to execute. Burgess gets the tone right: there are some fantastic scenes and descriptions here. The downside for casual readers is that while you don't need any knowledge of Shakespeare's life to read this book, there are so many allusions and in-jokes that I'm sure it would scare off many lay readers. Those who know just a little, though, will marvel at the blend of erudition and playfulness. The 'dark lady' by the way is held to be Malayan (or possibly Indonesian), a region well-known to Burgess.