William Shakespeare

Born in April 1564, William Shakespeare was the eldest surviving son of Mary and John Shakespeare's eight children. Although he was born in Stratford, he lived in London for most of his life. He married Anne Hathaway in November 1582 and had three children. During Shakespeare's life, Queen Elizabeth and King James I were the monarchs reigning.
In 1594, Shakespeare joined Lord Chamberlain's Men, a theatre company. He spent 5 years working for this group, and saved enough to buy a share in The Globe, a theatre. Later, the group was ordered to change the name to King's Men.

As well as writing at least 37 plays, Shakespeare also wrote poems. These were written in Old English. Some of the genres of his plays were histories (Richard II), comedies (A Midsummer Night's Dream), tragedies (Romeo and Juliet) and tragicomedies (Hamlet). In a Shakespearean comedy, the main characters tend to live on and succeed, whereas in a tragedy, the main character dies at the end.

Often, words were shortened in his writing. For example, "it is" became "'tis", "never" became "ne'er" and "give" became "gi'". However, these contractions were not always used. Also, many of the words used have very different meanings nowadays and were swear words when used back then, like "false catepillar".

Many of the lines spoken in Shakespeare's plays became extremely famous. Some commonly known ones are "O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?" and "O happy dagger!" (from Romeo and Juliet), and "Et tu, Brute?" (from Julius Caesar).

Shakespeare died in April 1616, having written at least 37 plays and many other things.