- Hardcover: 384 pages
- Publisher: Tinder Press (31 Mar. 2020)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1472223799
- ISBN-13: 978-1472223791
Synopsis
On a summer’s day in 1596, a young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to her bed with a fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, searches everywhere for help. Why is nobody at home?
Their mother, Agnes, is over a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London. Neither parent knows that one of the children will not survive the week.
Hamnet is a novel inspired by the son of a famous playwright. It is a story of the bond between twins, and of a marriage pushed to the brink by grief. It is also the story of a kestrel and its mistress; flea that boards a ship in Alexandria; and a glovemaker’s son who flouts convention in pursuit of the woman he loves. Above all, it is a tender and unforgettable reimagining of a boy whose life has been all but forgotten, but whose name was given to one of the most celebrated plays ever written.
Review
Maggie O’Farrell has to be one of the nations beloved authors, so it always a treat when she releases a new book. Hamnet is a book she says she has been wanting a write for a while after she learned about Hamnet at school, and it is her first historical novel. Hamnet is the story of Shakespeares family, in particular his son Hamnet and his twin Judith and their mother Agnes. With Shakespeare in London, Agnes and her three children remain in Stratford, carrying on with normal life. When Judith becomes unwell Hamnet does everything an eleven year old can, going to a physician, but he can’t find any of his family; Agnes is out collecting flowers and his Grandmother Mary and older sister Susanna are out on errands. This in turn sets the ball rolling for an emotional story line of grief, love, a twins bond and family.
Hamnet is a beautiful book to read, and I was fully immersed in the lives of Agnes, Judith, Hamnet and Susanna. The interesting thing with this book is that William Shakespeare is never named, he is just referred to as Hamnet’s father, Agnes’s husband and a son. I found this kept the focus on the story Agnes and her family, rather than the famous playwright of whom many books have been written. Maggie O’Farrell says this is an imagining of their story based around certain facts, there is very little historical evidence about Shakespeare and his family which adds to the interest of them.
Her imagining of the characters is wonderful, and even though the book is named Hamnet after the son, it is more about Agnes. Agnes is a woman who knows her own mind, she is twenty six when she marries Shakespeare, who is only eighteen. She knew she didn’t have many prospects as she was seen as different, with her medicinal herbs and love of nature and in particular her pet Kestrel and her bees. She was not a conventional wife, spending many days out in the fields, but her love for her husband and children shone through. She many be strong and wilful but she is also tender and loving.
Hamnet and Judith have that unbreakable bond that only twins have. Hamnet is distraught when Judith becomes unwell, he does everything he can to get help and when that fails he just lies in bed with her, to make sure she is not alone. Hamnet remembers times when they would swap places to fool people and it broke my heart when he told Judith that he wanted to swap places with her, that she should live and he should die. The tenderness and love shines through in Maggie O’Farrell writing of these two characters and their bond. When one twin is lost the grief pours from the page, its gut wrenching, the heartbreaking pain of the family is so well written and conveyed that I felt it myself.
Maggie O’Farrell’s writing is what makes this such a beautiful and compelling read. She weaves a rich tapestry of Shakespear’s early life, his marriage and his family. Maggie O’Farrell has a skill for scene setting in this book, almost like in a play she paints a picture of the setting rich in detail that you can picture it clearly in your mind before she brings in the characters. One of my favourite parts of the book was her description of how the plague came to England. She starts with a young boy from a ship playing with a monkey in Alexandria, and how one flea is the catalyst to where the fleas breed and come to England in a box of beads from Morano. Such wonderful prose, with colour and feeling flows with such ease that skill that it captivated me from the first page.
Hamnet is a story of one family, the bond between twins, the love in a marriage, how grief can unite and divide and ultimately about a little boy named Hamnet and his stamp on the world; the play Hamlet was named after him. Such rich prose takes you back in time and into the world of Agnes and her children, where they live without her famous husband. This is a tender, emotional and stunning read, and one I highly recommend; simply sublime !
I would like to thank Tinder Press and Anne Cater for the opportunity to take part in the blog tour for this wonderful book.
