The Great Lives in Graphics series is a new way of looking at the lives of famous and influential people.

It takes the essential dates and achievements of each person's life, mixes them with lesser-known facts and trivia, and uses infographics to show them in a fresh visual way that is genuinely engaging for children and young adults.

The result is a colourful, fascinating and often surprising representation of that person's life, work and legacy. Using timelines, maps, repeated motifs and many more beautiful and informative illustrations, readers learn not just about the main subject of the book but also about the cultural background of the time in which they lived.

You may already know that William Shakespeare was a playwright, but did you know he learned nothing but Latin at school? Or that he couldn't even spell his own name?