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Nicholas Shakespeare
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Nicholas Shakespeare
Nicholas William Richmond Shakespeare FRSL (born 3 March 1957) is a British novelist, biographer, broadcaster, and journalist. He was described by the Wall Street Journal as "one of the best English novelists of our time". He has written biographies of Bruce Chatwin, Ian Fleming, and his aunt in Priscilla: The Hidden Life of an Englishwoman in Wartime France. Shakespeare is also known for his charity work.
Born in Worcester, England to diplomat John William Richmond Shakespeare and his wife Lalage Ann, daughter of the travel writer and journalist S. P. B. Mais, Shakespeare grew up in Asia[where?] and South America, including Brazil, where his father worked at the British Embassy between 1966 and 1969. Shakespeare's great-great-great uncle is Anthony Fenn Kemp. John Shakespeare was later chargé d'affaires at Buenos Aires, before serving as Ambassador to Peru from 1983 to 1987, and Ambassador to Morocco from 1987 to 1990. Nicholas was educated at the Dragon School preparatory school in Oxford, then at Winchester College and at Magdalene College, Cambridge. He worked as a journalist for BBC television and then on The Times as assistant arts and literary editor. From 1988 to 1991, he was literary editor of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Telegraph.
Shakespeare's time in South America is represented in two novels, The Vision of Elena Silves (1989, Somerset Maugham Award, Betty Trask Award) and The Dancer Upstairs (1995, American Library Association Award for The Best Novel of the Year). Other works from this period are The Men Who Would Be King (1984), Londoners (1986) and The High Flyer (1993, long-listed for the Booker Prize).
In 1999, Shakespeare published his biography of Bruce Chatwin to widespread critical acclaim. This was followed by the novel Snowleg (2004, long-listed for the Booker Prize, Dublin IMPAC Award) a "place" book, In Tasmania (2004, winner of the Tasmania Book Prize 2007), Secrets of the Sea (2007, short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer's prize) and Inheritance (2010, long-listed for Dublin IMPAC Award). In 2010, he published Under the Sun, the letters of Bruce Chatwin, which he co-edited with Elizabeth Chatwin.
Nicholas Shakespeare has made several extended biographies for television: on Evelyn Waugh, Mario Vargas Llosa, Bruce Chatwin, Martha Gellhorn, and Dirk Bogarde. The Dancer Upstairs was made into a feature film of the same name in 2002, for which Shakespeare wrote the screenplay and which John Malkovich directed. Shakespeare was nominated as one of Granta's Best of British Young Novelists in 1993. He has written articles for Granta, the London Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement and The Monthly, among other publications.
Shakespeare's novels, which have been translated into 22 languages, place ordinary people against a background of significant events, as with The Dancer Upstairs, which deals with Abimael Guzmán, leader of Peru's Shining Path; and Snowleg, set partly during the Cold War in East Germany.
In 1999, Shakespeare was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
In 2010 Shakespeare was invited by the Anglo-Argentine Society to give the prestigious Borges Lecture in London.
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Nicholas Shakespeare
Nicholas William Richmond Shakespeare FRSL (born 3 March 1957) is a British novelist, biographer, broadcaster, and journalist. He was described by the Wall Street Journal as "one of the best English novelists of our time". He has written biographies of Bruce Chatwin, Ian Fleming, and his aunt in Priscilla: The Hidden Life of an Englishwoman in Wartime France. Shakespeare is also known for his charity work.
Born in Worcester, England to diplomat John William Richmond Shakespeare and his wife Lalage Ann, daughter of the travel writer and journalist S. P. B. Mais, Shakespeare grew up in Asia[where?] and South America, including Brazil, where his father worked at the British Embassy between 1966 and 1969. Shakespeare's great-great-great uncle is Anthony Fenn Kemp. John Shakespeare was later chargé d'affaires at Buenos Aires, before serving as Ambassador to Peru from 1983 to 1987, and Ambassador to Morocco from 1987 to 1990. Nicholas was educated at the Dragon School preparatory school in Oxford, then at Winchester College and at Magdalene College, Cambridge. He worked as a journalist for BBC television and then on The Times as assistant arts and literary editor. From 1988 to 1991, he was literary editor of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Telegraph.
Shakespeare's time in South America is represented in two novels, The Vision of Elena Silves (1989, Somerset Maugham Award, Betty Trask Award) and The Dancer Upstairs (1995, American Library Association Award for The Best Novel of the Year). Other works from this period are The Men Who Would Be King (1984), Londoners (1986) and The High Flyer (1993, long-listed for the Booker Prize).
In 1999, Shakespeare published his biography of Bruce Chatwin to widespread critical acclaim. This was followed by the novel Snowleg (2004, long-listed for the Booker Prize, Dublin IMPAC Award) a "place" book, In Tasmania (2004, winner of the Tasmania Book Prize 2007), Secrets of the Sea (2007, short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer's prize) and Inheritance (2010, long-listed for Dublin IMPAC Award). In 2010, he published Under the Sun, the letters of Bruce Chatwin, which he co-edited with Elizabeth Chatwin.
Nicholas Shakespeare has made several extended biographies for television: on Evelyn Waugh, Mario Vargas Llosa, Bruce Chatwin, Martha Gellhorn, and Dirk Bogarde. The Dancer Upstairs was made into a feature film of the same name in 2002, for which Shakespeare wrote the screenplay and which John Malkovich directed. Shakespeare was nominated as one of Granta's Best of British Young Novelists in 1993. He has written articles for Granta, the London Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement and The Monthly, among other publications.
Shakespeare's novels, which have been translated into 22 languages, place ordinary people against a background of significant events, as with The Dancer Upstairs, which deals with Abimael Guzmán, leader of Peru's Shining Path; and Snowleg, set partly during the Cold War in East Germany.
In 1999, Shakespeare was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
In 2010 Shakespeare was invited by the Anglo-Argentine Society to give the prestigious Borges Lecture in London.
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