Introducing Shakespeare: A Graphic Guide - Nick Groom, Piero 2013

Marriage

We do know that Will Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in late 1582. This union has provoked much biographical speculation. She was eight or nine years older than he was, and also three months pregnant. A predatory older woman? Or did Shakespeare woo her with his poems? His Sonnet 145 ends with a pun on her name, “Hathaway” ...

The newly-weds moved in with the Shakespeare family at Henley Street, where Will probably helped out his father whose trade was now declining. Perhaps he worked as a part-time professional scribe as well.

OUR DAUGHTER SUSANNA WAS BORN IN MAY. THREE YEARS LATER, STILL IN THE CROWDED FAMILY HOUSE, WE HAD TWINS - HAMNET AND JUDITH. SHORTLY THEREAFTER, WILL LEFT FOR LONDON TO WORK IN THE THEATRE.

Although he regularly returned to Stratford and invested his money there, he had effectively abandoned his young family for a precarious career.