As we pass through the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare we all, readers and writers alike, have to acknowledge that his work is not only the bedrock on which we build but the continental plate out of which everything we try to do struggles to survive and grow.

My favourite description of the work of Shakespeare has always been that provided by Harold Pinter

Shakespeare writes of the open wound and, through him, we know it open and know it closed

It comes from a note he wrote in 1951, it’s reproduced here by Granta