Study shows William Shakespeare as ruthless businessman New research depicts William Shakespeare as a grain hoarder, moneylender and tax dodger who became a wealthy businessman during a time of famine. Picture: Lefteris Pitarakis Source: AP Hoarder, moneylender, tax dodger - it's not how we usually think of William Shakespeare. Researchers from Aberystwyth University in Wales argue that we can't fully understand Shakespeare unless we study his often-overlooked business savvy. Ms Archer and her colleagues Howard Thomas and Richard Marggraf Turley combed through historical archives to uncover details of the playwright's parallel life as a grain merchant and property owner in the town of Stratford-upon-Avon whose practices sometimes brought him into conflict with the law. "Over a 15-year period he purchased and stored grain, malt and barley for resale at inflated prices to his neighbors and local tradesmen," they wrote, adding that Shakespeare "pursued those who could not (or would not) pay him in full for these staples and used the profits to further his own money-lending activities." Shakespeare lived and wrote in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, during a period known as the "Little Ice Age," when unusual cold and heavy rain caused poor harvests and food shortages. "I think now we have a rather rarefied idea of writers and artists as people who are disconnected from the everyday concerns of their contemporaries," Ms Archer said. But for most writers for most of history, hunger has been a major concern - and it has been as creatively energising as any other force. She argues that knowledge of the era's food insecurity can cast new light on Shakespeare's plays, including Coriolanus, which is set in an ancient Rome wracked by famine. The food protests in the play can be seen to echo the real-life 1607 uprising of peasants in the English Midlands, where Shakespeare lived. Shakespeare scholar Jonathan Bate told Britain's Sunday Times newspaper that Ms Archer and her colleagues had done valuable work, saying their research had "given new force to an old argument about the contemporaneity of the protests over grain-hoarding in Coriolanus." Ms Archer said famine also informs King Lear, in which an aging monarch's unjust distribution of his land among his three daughters sparks war. "In the play there is a very subtle depiction of how dividing up land also involves impacts on the distribution of food," Ms Archer said. Archer said the idea of Shakespeare as a hardheaded businessman may not fit with romantic notions of the sensitive artist, but we shouldn't judge him too harshly. Hoarding grain was his way of ensuring that his family and neighbors would not go hungry if a harvest failed. "Remembering Shakespeare as a man of hunger makes him much more human, much more understandable, much more complex," she said. In the 18th century, it was replaced with a more "writerly" memorial depicting Shakespeare with a tasseled cushion and a quill pen.