This graceful historical novel traces Shakespeare's momentous path of creative and emotional self-discovery focusing on his apprentice years and concluding before the great plays that would earn him his fame. It begins with the glover's son roaming the fields of Stratford, hungry for knowledge and restless to escape the boundaries of his small town and loveless marriage. Leaving his family for the turbulence and excitement of London, Will becomes a struggling actor whose charmed, reckless circle of literary and theatrical friends includes John Heminges, Ben Jonson, and Christopher Marlowe - men who will in time create an unforgettable period of theater. All the while, however, Shakespeare continues to challenge himself as a writer; soon he is selling his plays and earning acclaim in the world of the London theater and aristocracy. Yet perhaps his finest and most heartfelt writing of the period can be found in the sonnets written for the Earl of Southampton, the beautiful young lord whose affection and aloofness stir the poet's soul. The Earl becomes Shakespeare's patron, friend, romantic rival, and eventually, his lover. With the Earl and the bewitching Italian musician Emilia Bassano, Shakespeare plunges deep into a tempestuous love triangle that will threaten both his desire to write and his sense of himself.
My fifth novel CLAUDE & CAMILLE: A NOVEL OF CLAUDE MONET was published April 6th 2010. It was a work of tremendous passion for me to create Claude in his days of struggle to make a name for himself and to bring to life his great love for the elusive Camille whom he went on loving for as long as he lived though he lost her young. He wasn't always the old bearded man among his water lilies; he was handsome and desperately poor and she was beautiful; he wanted to succeed for himself and for her.
Art has been in my life since my first memories; both my parents were artists and I grew up with the smell of oil paints and was taken to art galleries; the stories of the impressionists' lives and works are among my earliest memories.
I was born in New York City and fell in love with history, music, Shakespeare and art almost at once. I loved all things English and European.
I started to write stories very young, and by the age of twenty had won prizes twice in a national story contest. In my early twenties, I left writing and began to train my voice for opera, and as a lyric coloratura soprano sang many roles, including a great deal of Mozart. I also became a balladeer with a specialty in English folk songs, a lecturer on English social history, formed a classical singing ensemble and an opera group called Strawberry, for which I translated Mozart's "La Clemenza di Tito." This led to my return to writing.
"Nicholas Cooke: Actor, Soldier, Physician, Priest" was published by W.W. Norton in the fall of 1993; it was followed by "The Physician of London" in 1995 and "The Players: A novel of the young Shakespeare" in 1997. "The Physician of London" won an American Book Award. "Marrying Mozart" was published in 2004, and has been translated into several languages: French, German, Italian, Polish, and Portuguese.
I am married to the poet and spiritual director Russell Clay. We make our home on the Upper West Side of New York City where we live in an apartment with thousands of books.
To me, being an historical novelist is one of the best things in the world!
