Shakespeare: A Life

Shakespeare's will begins with a declaration very similar to openings found in some of the 134 wills, made by other theatre people, which still exist from that time for comparison:

In the name of God Amen. I William Shackspeare of Stratford upon Avon in the county of Warwickshire gent., in perfect health & memory God be praised, do make & ordain this my last will & testament in manner & form following. That is to say first, I commend my Soul into the hands of God my Creator, hoping & assuredly believing through the only merits of Jesus Christ my Saviour to be made partaker of life everlasting. And my body to the earth whereof it is made.

Even before he had an indoor stage, he had begun the series which includes Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, and The Tempest. These plays are naïvely presentational, conciliatory in mood, less gestured and less emphatically structured than anything he had done before. They recall Tudor dramatic romances of his youth, as well as the miracle works of late medieval times. Why does he seem to reach back? In avoiding the limits of modern realism, logic, and literalness he might use his art to exploit rich areas of popular romance. But there is something more personal in his aims, if one judges from his insistent return to variations upon only a few themes. From the time of King Lear, he appears to have drawn on an effort he was making to set himself right with people he cared for, and perhaps to overcome some aspects of estrangement in his absences from home.