Hamnet: A vivid imagining of Shakespeare’s lost son

Maggie O’Farrell recreates the short life of the young Hamnet, whose name became interchangeable with the fictional character whose life is torn apart by death

Maggie O’Farrell: a writer who evocatively captures love and loss

FICTION

Hamnet

By Maggie O’Farrell

Tinder Press, €17

In 1596, an 11-year-old boy died of the plague in a house in Stratford-upon-Avon. His name was Hamnet Shakespeare. Less than four years later his father would write a play called Hamlet, a name so similar to Hamnet that in the records of 17th century Stratford the two names are used interchangeably.

The author Maggie O’Farrell has been fascinated by Shakespeare’s lost son, whose name has been ...