'Solitary genius? Thieving magpie? We live in copyright times, obsessed with Best. Freebury-Jones explores Shakespeare's world, where playwrights collaborated with, borrowed from and were influenced by each other. How exciting for actors nowadays to be reminded that "The play's the thing". Not authorship or provenance but Story-Power.'
Bruce Alexander, actor

'A marvellous guide that provides a window into the dramatic culture that Shakespeare inherited, absorbed and shaped, showing how his experience as an actor determined the course of his writing career.'
Andrew Hadfield, author of Thomas Nashe and Late Elizabethan Writing

'Darren Freebury-Jones attempts the impossible and pulls off the necessary. Both summative and innovative, this book accounts for where Shakespeare attribution studies are today while showing us where they are going tomorrow. It turns out that Shakespeare feathered his nest with borrowed plumes and, in so doing, became a full-fledged playwright.'
Paul Menzer, author of Shakespeare without Print

'Darren Freebury-Jones has written a lively and refreshingly good-tempered account of a notoriously complex subject which, like everything to do with Shakespeare, has become something of a scholarly minefield. No reader will agree with all of it, but it is good to have the facts and arguments laid out in a clear and comprehensible way.'
Lois Potter, author of The Life of William Shakespeare: A Critical Biography

Darren Freebury-Jones is a Lecturer in Shakespeare Studies at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. He is the author of Shakespeare's Tutor: The Influence of Thomas Kyd (2022) and has contributed to the Independent, the Guardian, the Times, the Telegraph and BBC Radio.