Title: Shakespearean tragedy
Content:  The English Renaissance, when Shakespeare was writing, was fueled by a renewed interest in Roman and Greek classics and neighboring renaissance literature written years earlier in Italy, France, and Spain. Shakespeare wrote the majority of his tragedies under the rule of James I, and their darker contents may reflect the general mood of the country following the death of Elizabeth I, as well as James' theatrical preferences. Shakespeare, as was customary for other playwrights in his day, used history, other plays, and non-dramatic literature as sources for his plays. In Elizabethan England there were no copyright or protections against plagiarism, so 
Title: Sonnet 128
Content:  to Henry Threw Stephenson, this time was characterized by a "general freedom of manners". He also points out that people were much more coarse in their discourse during that time and even Queen Elizabeth "swore like a trooper". This could allow Shakespeare to be more crude in his allusions and not hesitate to bring up more indecent sexual imagery without being criticized. During that time in history the bubonic plague was raging throughout Europe, and this meant that many London theaters were frequently shut down, which could have influenced Shakespeare to write more poetic literature and less for a stage audience. This lack of work might have also been able to provide him with more time to ponder and express his feelings of love.
Title: William Shakespeare
Content:  In 1593 and 1594, when the theatres were closed because of plague, Shakespeare published two narrative poems on sexual themes, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. He dedicated them to Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton. In Venus and Adonis, an innocent Adonis rejects the sexual advances of Venus; while in The Rape of Lucrece, the virtuous wife Lucrece is raped by the lustful Tarquin. Influenced by Ovid's Metamorphoses, the poems show the guilt and moral confusion that result from uncontrolled lust. Both proved popular and were often reprinted during Shakespeare's lifetime. A third narrative poem, A Lover's Complaint, in which a young woman laments her seduction by a persuasive suitor, was printed in the first edition of the Sonnets in 1609. Most scholars now accept that Shakespeare wrote A Lover's Complaint. Critics consider that its fine qualities are marred by leaden effects. The Phoenix and the Turtle, printed in Robert Chester's 1601 Love's Martyr, mourns the deaths of the legendary phoenix and his lover, the faithful turtle dove. In 1599, two early drafts of sonnets 138 and 144 appeared in The Passionate Pilgrim, published under Shakespeare's name but without his permission.
Title: Chronology of Shakespeare's plays
Content:  argues that Shakespeare used the source story from Ovid's Metamorphoses first to examine the tragic potential and then to exploit its comic and farcical elements in his next play. A possible topical allusion is the line "the death/Of learning, late decreased in beggary" (5.1.52–53), which could refer to the spate of deaths of popular playwrights in the early 1590s; Robert Greene in 1592, Christopher Marlowe in 1593 and Thomas Kyd in 1594. That the play culminates with the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta has led some to theorise it may have been written specifically for a wedding, with the most likely candidates being either the marriage of William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby, and 
Title: Shakespeare's plays
Content:  after the plague forced Shakespeare and his company of actors to leave London for periods between 1592 and 1594, Shakespeare began to use rhymed couplets in his plays, along with more dramatic dialogue. These elements showed up in The Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Almost all of the plays written after the plague hit London are comedies, perhaps reflecting the public's desire at the time for light-hearted fare. Other comedies from Shakespeare during this period include Much Ado About Nothing, The Merry Wives of Windsor and As You Like It. The middle grouping of Shakespeare's plays begins 
Title: William Shakespeare
Content:   Shakespeare's work has made a lasting impression on later theatre and literature. In particular, he expanded the dramatic potential of characterisation, plot, language, and genre. Until Romeo and Juliet, for example, romance had not been viewed as a worthy topic for tragedy. Soliloquies had been used mainly to convey information about characters or events, but Shakespeare used them to explore characters' minds. His work heavily influenced later poetry. The Romantic poets attempted to revive Shakespearean verse drama, though with little success. Critic George Steiner described all English verse dramas from Coleridge to Tennyson as "feeble variations on Shakespearean themes." Shakespeare influenced novelists such as Thomas Hardy, William Faulkner, and Charles Dickens. The American novelist Herman Melville's soliloquies owe much 
Title: Shakespeare's sonnets
Content:  work without obtaining Shakespeare's permission. Though Thorpe's taking on the dedication may be explained by the great demands of business and travel that Shakespeare was facing at this time, which may have caused him to deal with the printing production in haste before rushing out of town. After all, May 1609 was an extraordinary time: That month saw a serious outbreak of the plague, which shut down the theatres, and also caused many to flee London. Plus Shakespeare’s theatre company was on tour from Ipswich to Oxford. In addition, Shakespeare had been away from Stratford and in the same month, May, was being called on to tend to family and business there, and deal with the litigation of a lawsuit in Warwickshire that involved a substantial amount of money.
Title: Shakespeare's sonnets
Content:  poet attempting to compose a love poem at the behest of his king, Edward III. At the time Edward III was published, Shakespeare's sonnets were known by some, but they had not yet been published. The king, Edward III, has fallen in love with the Countess of Salisbury, and he tells Lodowick, his secretary, to fetch ink and paper. Edward wants Lodowick’s help in composing a poem that will sing the praises of the countess. Lodowick has a question: The king then expresses and dictates his passion in exuberant poetry, and asks Lodowick to read back to him what he has been able to write down. Lodowick reads: When the countess enters, the poetry-writing scene is interrupted without Lodowick having accomplished much poetry—only two lines:
Title: Shakespeare's late romances
Content:  Because of the shift in style, as well as Shakespeare's physical state, there has been much debate about why the late plays were written as they were. Dowden created a biographical view that suggested that Shakespeare was suffering from depression when he wrote his tragedies, and had worked his way out of it to create the romances. SirEdmund Chambers suggested that he suffered a breakdown while writing Timon of Athens, and the romances reflect a kind of psychological convalescence. Clifford Leech viewed the romances as infected with a kind of fantastical puritanism that came from Shakespeare's personal revulsion from sex. D G James believed that Shakespeare ran out of poetic 
Title: Shakespeare's sonnets
Content:  In his plays, Shakespeare himself seemed to be a satiric critic of sonnets—the allusions to them are often scornful. Then he went on to create one of the longest sonnet-sequences of his era, a sequence that took some sharp turns away from the tradition. He may have been inspired out of literary ambition, and a desire to carve new paths apart from the well-worn tradition. Or he may have been inspired by biographical elements in his life. It is thought that the biographical aspects have been over-explored and over-speculated on, especially in the face of a paucity of evidence. The critical focus has turned instead (through New Criticism 

Question: what prompted shakespeare to write poetry?
Answer: Thomas More.