Writing an introduction to William Shakespeare seems a little silly. In fact, he's almost certainly as popular as Jesus. Okay, that may be a bit of a stretch, but who doesn't know about the most successful English Poet, Actor, Playwright that has ever lived? He even goes by the name of 'England's National Poet'. He's hung onto that title since the 1950s, which either means English poets really have to up their game or his literary reign is untouchable.
During his life time he invented 1700 words of his own, and much more impressively, wrote 37 plays and 154 sonnets, which are still influencing the current landscapes of poetry. The last play that Shakespeare wrote was the Tempest, before he died in the same year as his wife, Anne Hathaway, in 1616, aged approximately 52.