Hamlet is Shakespeare's most popular, and most puzzling, play. It follows the form of a “revenge tragedy,” in which the hero, Hamlet, seeks vengeance against his father's murderer, his uncle Claudius, now the king of Denmark.

Shakespeare's real name was recorded as Gulielmus Shakspere at his baptism in 1564, which is the Latin word for William. He called himself 'Will' in his Sonnets and most of his contemporaries referred to him as William Shakespeare, so it's safe to say that this was his name.

William Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616, 400 years ago, in the small Warwickshire town of his birth. He was 52 years of age: still young (or youngish, at least) by modern reckonings, though his death mightn't have seemed to his contemporaries like an early departure from the world.