The Shakespeare Guide to Italy: Retracing the Bard's Unknown Travels

by Richard Paul Roe

Overview

“Exciting, original, and convincing. . . . This book is essential reading for all concerned with who really wrote the works of Shakespeare. A thrilling journey of discovery." —Sir Derek Jacobi, Shakespearean actor, Associate Artist, Royal Shakespeare Company

Equal parts literary detective story and vivid travelogue, The Shakespeare Guide to Italy chronicles author Richard Paul Roe’s thirty-year quest to find the locations in which Shakespeare set his ten Italian plays—delivering a text which will forever change our understanding of how to read the Bard of Avon and irrevocably alter our vision of who William Shakespeare really was. 

More than 150 images illustrate and enhance Roe’s captivating narrative, illuminating his lifelong journey and shining a light into the depths of Shakespeare’s experiences in Italy. Until now, Shakespeare’s use of Italian backdrops—Romeo and Juliet’s Verona, Othello’s Venice, Much Ado About Nothing’s Messina, to name a few—has been the source of controversy and conjecture. With The Shakespeare Guide to Italy, Roe’s meticulous study reveals the secrets that have eluded scholars for centuries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062074263
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	11/08/2011
Edition description:	Original
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.42(w) x 9.72(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

In addition to executing a private legal practice for more than forty years, Richard Paul Roe undertook a lifelong study of Shakespeare’s Italian Plays. A recipient of degrees in English literature and European history from the University of California at Berkeley, as well as a juris doctor summa cum laude from the Southwestern University School of Law, he lived in Pasadena, California, until his death in 2010.

Table of Contents

List of Maps vii

Acknowledgments ix

Foreword Hilary Roe Metternich xi

Introduction Daniel L Wright xiii

Preface 1

Chapter 1 Romeo and Juliet "Devoted Love in Verona" 7

Chapter 2 The Two Gentlemen of Verona—Part 1"Sailing to Milan" 35

Chapter 3 The Two Gentlemen of Verona—Part 2"Milan: Arrivals and Departures" 63

Chapter 4 The Taming of the Shrew "Pisa to Padua" 87

Chapter 5 The Merchant of Venice—Part 1"Venice: the City and the Empire" 115

Chapter 6 The Merchant of Venice—Part 2 "Venice: Trouble and Trial" 141

Chapter 7 Othello"Strangers and Streets, Swords and Shoes" 159

Chapter 8 A Midsummer Night's Dream "Midsummer in Sabbioneta' 179

Chapter 9 All's Well That Ends Well "France and Florence" 189

Chapter 10 Much Ado About Nothing "Misfortune in Messina" 217

Chapter 11 The Winter's Tale "A Cruel Notion Resolved" 245

Chapter 12 TheTempest"Island of Wind and Fire" 265

Epilogue 297

Biblogarphy 299

What People are Saying About This

William Leahy

“This represents a hugely significant intervention in the study of Shakespeare and his dramatic works.”

Derek Jacobi

“Exciting, original, and convincing....This book is essential reading for all concerned with who really wrote the works of Shakespeare. A thrilling journey of discovery.”

Mark Rylance

“Unless someone can prove him wrong, anyone who claims to have written the plays of Shakespeare needs to show some Italian travel documents.”

Michael York

“This is a revolutionary and revelatory book, part thrilling detective story and part sober scholarly treatise.”

Editorial Reviews

This Baedeker to the "Italian plays," an eccentric labor of love by an attorney who works like crazy to find hidden truths via minute analyses of texts, has at its core the long-accepted scholarly belief that Shakespeare never traveled, certainly not extensively, through Continental Europe and Italy. From here, the book veers into murkier territory. For Roe (who died last year), it is the earl of Oxford who made all the trips, accounting for details and an intimate erudition regarding the Mediterranean setting of 10 of the plays attributed to Shakespeare. Thus, many of the so-called topographic blunders claimed by scholars in The Two Gentlemen of Verona are resolved through a better understanding of a long-vanished canal system; Romeo and Juliet details aspects of settings (types of trees, Juliet's window, and other facts) that come from no surviving source that a nontraveler could have accessed; Prospero's island in The Tempest is positively identified by geologic configurations as the island of Vulcano off Sicily's northeastern shore. Overall, the title is misleading: Shakespeare of Stratford turns out to be no guide at all. Considerable learning and ingenuity in working through the details of location and character are offset by an odd delusion, which, in fairness, the author shares with many serious fans, that the Bard was not Shakespeare of Stratford, though Roe only slyly implies this belief. 180 color and b&w photos; maps. (Nov. 8)

Publishers Weekly

A fascinating look at a largely untouched aspect of Shakespeare’s identity and influences. Recommended for Shakespeare enthusiasts and scholars as well as travelers looking for a new perspective, this is also particularly intriguing as a companion to specific plays.” — Library Journal (starred review)

“An exceptionally entertaining, enlightening, and handsome companion for a thrillingly literate Italian sojourn.” — Booklist

“Exciting, original, and convincing. . . . This book is essential reading for all concerned with who really wrote the works of Shakespeare. A thrilling journey of discovery.” — Sir Derek Jacobi, Shakespearean actor, Associate Artist, Royal Shakespeare Company

“This is a revolutionary and revelatory book, part thrilling detective story and part sober scholarly treatise.” — Michael York, Shakespearean actor of stage and screen and co-author of A Shakespearean Actor Prepares

“This represents a hugely significant intervention in the study of Shakespeare and his dramatic works.” — Dr. William Leahy, Head of the School of Arts, Shakespeare Authorship Studies, Brunel University

From the Publisher

An exceptionally entertaining, enlightening, and handsome companion for a thrillingly literate Italian sojourn.

Booklist

This represents a hugely significant intervention in the study of Shakespeare and his dramatic works.

Dr. William Leahy

Exciting, original, and convincing. . . . This book is essential reading for all concerned with who really wrote the works of Shakespeare. A thrilling journey of discovery.

Sir Derek Jacobi

This is a revolutionary and revelatory book, part thrilling detective story and part sober scholarly treatise.

Michael York

An exceptionally entertaining, enlightening, and handsome companion for a thrillingly literate Italian sojourn.

Booklist

Unless someone can prove him wrong, anyone who claims to have written the plays of Shakespeare needs to show some Italian travel documents.

Mark Rylance

"This represents a hugely significant intervention in the study of Shakespeare and his dramatic works."

Doctor - William Leahy

"Exciting, original, and convincing....This book is essential reading for all concerned with who really wrote the works of Shakespeare. A thrilling journey of discovery."

Sir - Derek Jacobi

For this literary journey through Shakespeare's ten plays set in Italy, Roe, an English and history scholar and an attorney who died in 2010, explored the places that inspired many of Shakespeare's classics and presents a solid argument that Shakespeare was well traveled. Roe spent over 20 years traveling throughout Italy with Shakespeare plays in hand. The thrill of discovery he felt throughout his quest leaps off the page and makes for an accessible read. The connections he draws among the plays and locales are backed up with pictures, maps, literary references, and well-documented arguments. Particularly striking is Roe's argument that A Midsummer Night's Dream is not set in Greece, as traditionally accepted, but in a small town in Italy. VERDICT A fascinating look at a largely untouched aspect of Shakespeare's identity and influences. Recommended for Shakespeare enthusiasts and scholars as well as travelers looking for a new perspective, this is also particularly intriguing as a companion to specific plays.—Katie Lawrence, Chicago

Library Journal