Shakespeare and the Poet's Life
explores a central biographical question: why did Shakespeare choose to cease writing sonnets and court-focused long poems like
The Rape of Lucrece
and
Venus and Adonis
and continue writing plays? Author Gary Schmidgall persuasively demonstrates the value of contemplating the professional reasons Shakespeare—or any poet of the time—ceased being an Elizabethan court poet and focused his efforts on drama and the Globe. Students of Shakespeare and of Renaissance poetry will find Schmidgall's approach and conclusions both challenging and illuminating.