The book pursues a usage-oriented strategy of language description by infusing it with the central concept of post-structural semiotics and literary theory - that of intertextual memory. Its principal claim is that all new facts of language are grounded in the speakers' memory of previous experiences of using language. It is a ""speech to speech"" model: every new fact of speech is seen as emerging out of recalled fragments that are reiterated and manipulated at the same time.

Blending fact with fiction and written in diary form, this unique biography of Shakespeare encapsulates his life like never before—from his views on daily events to vivid impressions of the Elizabethan era and his role within such a world. Delightfully whimsical, this distinctive life story provides answers to questions such as What was Shakespeare thinking while he wrote Hamlet? What did he and Ben Jonson talk about when they were having a drink together? and What might Shakespeare have said to the formidable Elizabeth I? Incorporating fragments of lines and phrases from The Bard’s plays and poems along with fascinating endnotes, this portrait will seize readers with its fresh, offbeat approach to the man and his work.

Best known for his works "The Waste Land", "Four Quartets", and "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," T.S. Eliot is one of the most popular 20th-century poets studied in high school and college English classes today. Eliot's masterful use of classical allusions throughout his works demonstrates the great importance he placed on tradition and its place within literary history. Believing that the fragments of a once-great culture surrounded the modern world through literature, he used his writing to recreate the past through tradition.