Paul 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). Professor 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.

'What a fresh and lovely idea! I've been speaking the sonnets for most of my life. They are such wonderful training for an actor, and the notes and paraphrases in this book are just what we all need to guide us through them.' Judi Dench

• Introduction Paul Edmondson and Stanley Wells; About this Volume; Sonnets; Textual Notes, All the Sonnets of Shakespeare: Literal Paraphrases, Numerical Index of Shakespeare's Sonnets (1609), Index of First Lines.

Paul 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). Professor 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.

'What a fresh and lovely idea! I've been speaking the sonnets for most of my life. They are such wonderful training for an actor, and the notes and paraphrases in this book are just what we all need to guide us through them.' Judi Dench

• Introduction Paul Edmondson and Stanley Wells; About this Volume; Sonnets; Textual Notes, All the Sonnets of Shakespeare: Literal Paraphrases, Numerical Index of Shakespeare's Sonnets (1609), Index of First Lines.