Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

The Blurb On The Back:

Agnes eyes it, then takes it with two fingers and flattens it against her mud splattered apron. For a moment she cannot tell what she is looking at. It is a printed page. There are many letters, so many, in rows, grouped into words. There is her husband’s name, at the top, and the word ‘tragedie’. And there, right in the middle, in the largest letters of all, is the name of her son, her boy.

On a summer’s day in 1596, a young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to her bed with a fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, searches everywhere for help. Why is nobody at home?

Their mother, Agnes, is over a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London.

Neither parent knows that one of the children will not survive the week.

Hamnet is a novel inspired by the son of a famous playwright. It is a story of the bond between twins, and of a marriage pushed to the brink by grief. It is also the story of a flea that boards a ship in Alexandria; a kestrel and its mistress, and a glovemaker’s son who flouts convention in pursuit of the woman he loves. Above all, it is a tender and unforgettable reimagining of a boy whose life has been all but forgotten, but whose name was given to one of the most celebrated plays ever written.

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

Maggie O’Farrell’s gripping historical novel (now an Oscar-winning film) is about love, grief and making sense of personal tragedy, all shown through the lense of Shakespeare’s family (although the man himself is never named). Shown mainly through the eyes of his wife, Agnes (here a determined woman with a supernatural ability to tell a person’s fate) it’s above all else a very human story that shows Shakespeare as both a man and a playwright.

Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the review copy of this book.