Abstract

Dan Falk, the author of this engaging if informal book, is a science journalist, broadcaster, and freelance writer, whose achievements merited him a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at MIT in 2011–2012. Full disclosure imperatives require me to acknowledge having met him on an eclipse expedition to Easter Island in 2010, where I recall learning about his interests in astrophotography. I am sure, however, that should we meet again, we are unlikely to recognize one another. Thus, as an unbiased reader , I can report that The Science of Shakespeare is a testament to the thoroughness with which Falk has carried out his research, both in libraries and in the offices of everyone, it would appear, who has so much as dabbled in the question of whether Shakespeare knew anything about the scientific developments of his day and how, if he did, this ..