Fool: In Search of Henry VIII’s Closest Man Peter K Andersson Princeton University Press, 224 pages, £22
The play Henry VIII, written by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher, opens with a warning. Those who have made their way to the Globe Theatre expecting to “hear a merry bawdy play” can expect disappointment, for they, the prologue puns, “Will be deceived”. This play is serious, even tragic, portraying how “mightiness meets misery” where there is no room for merriness – and thus no room for the king’s fool himself, Will Somer.