Best-selling author Jodi Picoult, has an impressive resume of novels, all of which share a similar framework. Picoult takes current, often controversial, social issues and weaves them into a powerful story with plenty of suspenseful twists and turns. She creates complex characters who engage with these issues for various reasons and from different perspectives. She’s a master at showing us both sides of the coin.
“By Any Other Name” shares this framework, but because it takes place in two different centuries more than 400 years apart, it has a much different feel from her other 28 novels. Picoult sets reader expectation high by saying this is the book she’s been trying to write her whole life.
In this story, she addresses the invisibility of women and the difficulty of getting their voices heard, in history and today. However, she also manages to work in neurodiversity, racism, domestic violence, white privilege, marginalized groups and a few more I’ve probably overlooked. Another huge part of this book is the primary source research she’s done into Shakespeare’s life to bring him alive as a character in this story.
In the beginning, we meet Melina Green. It’s May 2013 and she’s a senior at Bard College in New York state, hoping to become a playwright. She’s about to discover what generations of women have learned before her about voicelessness and invisibility.
In 1581 Elizabethan England, we meet 12-year-old Emilia Bassano. Years before, her family emigrated from Italy to England to serve King Henry VIII as court musicians. At age 7, she became the ward of a widowed Countess. Time spent with the Countess has enriched her life. She’s become highly educated, well-traveled and her curiosity and creativity encouraged.
In 1611, at age 44, Bassano became the first woman published in England for her book of poetry. Do you think that was the first work she wrote? Picoult sure doesn’t. It’s been suggested that Shakespeare, was not the author of all, or perhaps any, of his plays. With her detailed descriptions of a very real Emilia Bassano; her life experience, her skills, her access to the theatre world, Picoult makes a relevant case that some of the credit should go to Bassano.
In alternating chapters, readers travel back and forth in time with the stories of two woman, related by blood, striving to achieve satisfaction through their writing but finding out whether it’s the 16th or the 21st Century, obstacles exist for women.
“By Any Other Name” by Jodi Picoult is available in our public libraries.
