Shakespeare’s career began on stage but, when the plague closed theatres in 1592, he turned to the more lucrative and prestigious ʻpure’ poetry with Venus and Adonis. A weekend of exploration whose central focus will be those most revealing, yet mysterious products of Shakespeare’s genius, the sonnets. David Lindley (www.highamhall.com/david-lindley) Residential: £233 Non-residential: £166 Clare Smout’s MACBETH AND CAESAR is on 21 February.