Shakespeare’s genius was not confined to the many plays he wrote and produced. He also wrote poetry. The long narrative poem Venus and Adonis was published in 1593, the first of Shakespeare’s works to actually be published by Shakespeare. This poem was followed by another long narrative poem—The Rape of Lucrece, first published in 1594.
While writing his plays, Shakespeare was also composing sonnets, a format adapted by English poets from its Petrarchan origins. Although he probably began composing sonnets early in his writing career, evidence exists that Shakespeare continued revising his sonnets during the 1590s and through the early 1600s, finally publishing the entire sequence in 1609. The sonnet sequence was followed by “A Lover’s Complaint,” which was probably composed earlier (1602—5), and a collection of occasional poems.
Shakespeare died April 23, 1616. Although Shakespeare’s authorship of these plays has been questioned by those who suggest that he did not pen the works, he was quite well known in Elizabethan London, and it would have been difficult for a sustained conspiracy to exist. In the end, it really does not matter whether the man we know as William Shakespeare composed the plays attributed to him or not. The plays exist for our enjoyment, and that is sufficient.
