This exquisitely illustrated and updated edition of Bill Bryson's best-selling biography of William Shakespeare takes the reader on an enthralling journey through Elizabethan England and the eccentricities of Shakespearean scholarship. Includes exclusive audio of Shakespeare's sonnets, read by Sir John Gielgud.

Bill Bryson describes himself as a reluctant traveller, but even when he stays safely in his own study at home, he can't contain his curiosity about the world around him. This book is his quest to understand everything that has happened from the Big Bang to the rise of civilization.

Presenting a tour of English from its mongrel origins to its status as the world's most-spoken tongue; its apparent simplicity to its deceptive complexity; its vibrant swearing to its uncertain spelling and pronunciation, this book covers curious eccentricities that make it as maddening to learn and as flexible to use.

After nearly two decades in Britain, Bill Bryson took the decision to move back to the USA. Before leaving his much-loved home in North Yorkshire, he took one last trip around the UK, and in this book, he turns an affectionate but laconic eye on his adopted country.

Australia has more things that can kill you than anywhere else. Nevertheless, Bill Bryson journeyed to the country and promptly fell in love with it. The people are cheerful, their cities are clean, the beer is cold and the sun nearly always shines.

This short biography of William Shakespeare by world famous writer Bill Bryson brims with the author's inimitable wit and intelligence.

Bill Bryson shoulders his backpack, keeps a tight hold on his wallet and heads for Europe. He retraces his travels as a student twenty years earlier with caustic hilarity and his own unique brand of humour. Born in Des Moines, Iowa, Bill Bryson lived in North Yorkshire for many years. First published in 1991 by Secker & Warburg.

A guide to the world's unspoilt sights and experiences. It offers practical advice on where to stay, where to eat and when to go, as well as useful 'Need to Know' facts, ensure that you get the most out of your time away.

Some say that the first hint that Bill Bryson was not of Planet Earth came when his mother sent him to school in lime-green Capri pants. Others think it all started with his discovery, at the age of six, of a woollen jersey of rare fineness. In this memoir, he explores the ordinary kid he once was, and the curious world of 1950s America.

An account of one man's rediscovery of America and his search for the perfect small town. Instead he finds a continent that is doubly lost: lost to itself because it is blighted by greed, pollution, mobile homes and television; and lost to him because he has become a foreigner in his own country.

After nearly two decades in England, Bill Bryson returned to the country of his birth. Gathered here are 18 months' worth of his Mail on Sunday columns about that strange phenomena, the American way of life, in which he brings his bemused wit to bear on one of the world's craziest countries.

An entertaining, anecdotal look at the origins of language and ideas in the USA. Bryson explains why two bicycle repairmen from Ohio succeeded in mastering manned flight, why the assassination of President Garfield led to the invention of air conditioning, and many other improbable but true facts.

From the author of Notes from a Small Island and The Lost Continent comes this humorous report on his walk along the Appalachian Trail. The Trail is the longest continuous footpath in the world, and it snakes through some of the wildest and most spectacular landscapes in America.

Covers the mysteries of time and space, the obsessive scientists and the methods they used, the theories, the accidental discoveries which advanced whole areas of science when the people were actually looking for something else (or in the wrong direction) and the fact that the universe exists and life came to be on this planet.

A guide to the problems of English usage and spelling. It lets you discover whether you should care about split infinitives, or were wondering if that newsreader was right to say 'an historic day'.

A funny spoof about the ascent of a 40,000-and-a-half-foot peak. Many thought on first publication in 1956, that it was inspired by the conquest of Everest in 1953. Bowman had in fact drawn on the earlier adventures of Bill Tilman and his 1937 Nandi Devi expedition.

Examining the mother tongue, this book explores the countless varieties of English and the perils of marketing brands with names like Pschitt and Super Piss. It also contains sections on the oddities of swearing and spelling, spoonerisms and Scrabble, and a consideration of what we mean by 'good English'.

Bill Bryson goes to Kenya at the invitation of CARE International, a charity which works with local communities to eradicate poverty around the world. Travelling around the country, Bryson casts his eye on a continent new to him, and writes a diary with wry observation and curious insight.

What is the difference between cant and jargon, or assume and presume? What is a fandango? How do you spell supersede? Is it hippy or hippie? This title includes a selection of spellings and usages, covering such head-scratchers as capitalization, plurals, abbreviations and foreign names and phrases.

Thousands of barns are scattered among the villages, meadows and pastures of the Yorkshire Dales and make the landscape like no other. Stone structures of great character, they form a monument to immense labour in past centuries. This book takes a look at the barns of the Dales in depth.