How can we look afresh at Shakespeare as a writer of sonnets? What new light might they shed on his career, personality, and sexuality? Shakespeare wrote sonnets for at least thirty years, not only for himself, for professional reasons, and for those he loved, but also in his plays, as prologues, as epilogues, and as part of their poetic texture. This ground-breaking book assembles all of Shakespeare's sonnets in their probable order of composition. An inspiring introduction debunks long-established biographical myths about Shakespeare's sonnets and proposes new insights about how and why he wrote them. Explanatory notes and modern English paraphrases of every poem and dramatic extract illuminate the meaning of these sometimes challenging but always deeply rewarding witnesses to Shakespeare's inner life and professional expertise. Beautifully printed and elegantly presented, this volume will be treasured by students, scholars, and every Shakespeare enthusiast.

Paul Edmondson, The Shakespeare Birthplace TrustPaul Edmondson is Head of Research and Knowledge and Director of the Stratford-upon-Avon Poetry Festival for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. He is the author, co-author, and co-editor of many books and articles about Shakespeare, including Shakespeare: Ideas in Profile (2015), Twelfth Night (2005), The Shakespeare Circle: An Alternative Biography (2015) and Shakespeare Beyond Doubt: Evidence, Argument, Controversy (2013) (both with Stanley Wells for Cambridge University Press), Shakespeare's Creative Legacies (with Peter Holbrook, 2016); Finding Shakespeare's New Place: an archaeological biography (with Kevin Colls and William Mitchell, 2016) and New Places: Shakespeare and Civic Creativity (co-edited with Ewan Fernie, 2018).

Stanley Wells, The Shakespeare Birthplace TrustProfessor Sir Stanley Wells Stanley Wells, CBE, FRSL, is Honorary President at The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. His many books include Shakespeare: For All Time (2002), Looking for Sex in Shakespeare (2004), Shakespeare & Co. (2006), Shakespeare, Sex, and Love (2010) and Great Shakespeare Actors (2015). He edited Shakespeare Survey for almost twenty years, and is co-editor of The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Stage (with Sarah Stanton, Cambridge, 2002), The New Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare (with Margreta de Grazia, Cambridge, 2010) and The Shakespeare Circle: An Alternative Biography (with Paul Edmondson, Cambridge, 2015). He is also the General Editor of the Oxford and Penguin editions of Shakespeare.