dagblog - Comments for "Shakespeare "Authorship Debates" and Amateur Scholarship"

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Jos — Sat, 02 Apr 2016 13:26:01 +0000

In reply to IF you had a typewriter in

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Wait, it is your hypothesis

Verified Atheist — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 15:45:54 +0000

Wait, it is your hypothesis that Shakespeare is a thief, claiming attribution for works that he has plagiarized, or that Shakespeare is a pseudonym? Making both claims, while possible, seems very counter-intuitive.

So, you claim that a

Doctor Cleveland — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 14:49:42 +0000

In reply to Not if the real author is

So, you claim that a dedication that says it's from William Shakespeare is actually a sign that it's by Henry Neville instead?

Weren't you angry at me for saying that you were using "documents that explicitly name William Shakespeare as the author" to argue for doubt? But you are doing that. I was not expressing bias. I was explaining facts.

Not if the real author is

Bruce Leyland — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 06:52:49 +0000

In reply to Oh, and of course, you

Not if the real author is Southampton's best friend, Sir Henry Neville.

Oh, and of course, you

Doctor Cleveland — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 04:04:41 +0000

In reply to So, the Parnassus plays name

Oh, and of course, you started off mentioning Lucrece and Venus and Adonis, both of which have signed dedications from Shakespeare to the dedicatee.

When he writes "Dear Lord of Southampton, I hope you like this poem of mine, William Shakespeare," THAT blows the Shakespeare-is-Shakespeare case right out of the water.

So, the Parnassus plays name

Doctor Cleveland — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 03:58:00 +0000

In reply to As mentioned, I had hoped

So, the Parnassus plays name Shakespeare as the author, precisely as I said.

And none of your other examples either mention Shakespeare by name at all, or deny that he wrote his works, Huh.

Your original post also mentioned the First Folio prefatory material (Heminges and Condell's material, and Jonson's poem), both of which also explicitly name Shakespeare as author.

So, in fact, your long post does not dispute my factual claim. Huh again.

Does any document from the period name YOUR favorite candidate in plain, explicit language? No codes, no anagrams, no allusions to allusions to allusions, just a plain declaration that X wrote the plays?

As mentioned, I had hoped

Bruce Leyland — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 01:35:13 +0000

In reply to Dear Bruce,

As mentioned, I had hoped that you would leave the posts unchanged, and allow the reader to come to their own conclusions. I note that you’ve elected to edit your earlier post to insert a potshot.

“[For those of you scoring at home, some of the things that Bruce says raise doubt about Shakespeare's authorship are documents that explicitly name William Shakespeare as the author. It's that bad.]”

I’m not sure why you’ve done this, the insertion doesn’t contain any content, or attempt at balance. It’s just an authoritarian potshot. So, where you offer sarcasm by way of argument, I’ll offer real evidence. Of course these documents mention Shakespeare and his authorship – that is why they’re noteworthy. These documents mention him in ways that are negative, and in relation to the authorship of the greatest writer in the English language, unexpected.

George Buc, stationer and later Master of the Revels – a respected theatre professional – in an annotation on Locrine (which is attributed on the title page to W.S.) complains that the play was actually written by his kinsman Charles Tilney and “s[ome] fellon hath published [it]”. Does this not constitute an unexpected piece of evidence in relation to his authorship? You declined to acknowledge this previously – “as it would be dishonest”.

In Greene’s Groats-worth of Wit (1592) Greene rails against actors and in particular cautions the university-educated writers against:

...an vpstart Crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers hart wrapt in a Players hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you: and being an absolute Iohannes fac totum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrey.

This apparent reference to Shakespeare has been taken to refer to him as an actor, certainly, and as some sort of a writer, probably. Irrespective, the reference is profoundly negative.

Return to Parnassus is the last of three “Parnassus” plays performed at Cambridge University between 1598 and 1601. The author/s of these remarkable plays is unknown, but the perspective is that of a university-educated dramatist. Return to Parnassus contains numerous references to Shakespeare. It also presents his fellow actors Burbage and Kempe. They are characterised as dolts, who think that Metamorphosis is a playwright, and applaud the ability of “our fellow Shakespeare” to write better than the educated writers.
Orthodox scholars interpret these satirical references to Shakespeare, as bemoaning the success of non-university-educated authors, while reserving some respect for Shakespeare the author. Indeed, the plays depict the torments of university-educated poets at the hands of moneyed ignorance. However, in the special case of Shakespeare, Doubters see the play as magnifying a particular comic irony, in the character of Gullio. Gullio is a superb narcissistic buffoon, uneducated but rich. He is wholly concerned with appearances:

I stood stroking up my haire, which became me very admirably…

He steals indiscriminately from the university poets (exploiting their poverty), and presents a mish-mash of their work as his own. Gullio is closely associated with Shakespeare. His name is a conflation of Gull (a dupe) and Gulielmus (William). His literary “pin-up” is William Shakespeare:

O sweet Mr Shakespeare! I’le have his picture in my study at the courte.

In a comedy, when a buffoon worships, it is always a tin god in whom the buffoon’s foibles are magnified. Always, the audience knows the object of adoration is suspect. (compare Mr Collins and Lady Catherine de Bourgh in Pride and Prejudice). If Gullio were to worship an acknowledged master about whom the audience had no doubt, this would be a very lame comic choice. Rather, this Mr. Shakespeare like Guullio's authorship is in some very real way, suspect.

Later, Judicio (the voice of the playwright) reserves four lines to comment on Shakespeare’s poems only:
Who loves not Adons love, or Lucrece rape?
His sweeter verse contaynes hart throbbing line,
Could but a graver subject him content
Without loves foolish lazy languishment.
This praise seems genuine, if qualified and brief compared with the copious praise for the university poet Spenser and Ben Jonson the bricklayer. Clearly, the author admired Shakespeare’s poetic works, though Judicio makes no mention of his many plays. What is not explicitly stated is the writer’s attitude to Shakespeare the man. This must be inferred from the character of Gullio.

Ben Jonson in Every Man Out of his Humour (1599) satirises Shakespeare’s ongoing application from 1596 for a coat of arms to include the motto Non sanz droict (Not without right). The foolish Sogliardo envisions his own bizarre colours as a headless boar, rampant on a silver dish. The character Buffone says:

...he has decyphered him well: a swine without a head, without brain, wit, anything indeed, ramping to gentility.

The wits of the play suggest that a motto be added, Not without mustard.

Would it really be “dishonest” if you were to acknowledge this as unexpected evidence? I don’t object to your dismissing this evidence as unimportant – you are very much entitled to your view. However, I do object to your dismissal of it as non-existant, which it clearly isn’t.

I would encourage people to examine the original documents constituting the evidence for Shakespeare of Stratford as the author (which I believe you overstate as “massive”), balanced against evidence which undermines this view. By the way, calling on your stated knowledge of the stationers register - how many mentions of Shakespeare are there?

I hope readers will see that while in your article you have taken a lofty tone as an open-minded and genial teacher, by contrast in this discussion your “don’t argue” posts entirely belie this posture. Nor do smug back-slapping bon mots with your colleagues present well. They seem to me, as Jonson wrote of Shakespeare’s Pericles;

Scraps, out of every dish/Thrown forth, and rak’t into the common-tub.

I apologise if I misunderstood your first comment regarding students in the article, nevertheless I still don’t find it abundantly clear. In your clarification you express frustration at the “obvious” insights of undergraduates. I hope you’re able to get past this, because facilitating their learning would seem to be your responsibility.

Bruce Leyland

Absolutely. It's a terrible

Doctor Cleveland — Mon, 05 Jan 2015 04:27:07 +0000

In reply to All kidding aside, it is

Absolutely. It's a terrible waste.

All kidding aside, it is

ocean-kat — Mon, 05 Jan 2015 04:17:53 +0000

In reply to And yet some people dedicate

All kidding aside, it is terribly sad. I met a dude a few months ago at a local shindig and his response to every topic was some conspiracy theory. Think of the hours reading bullshit to the point that it was memorized sufficiently to fluently discuss it as length. Think of what could have been accomplished with those hours if they weren't spent memorizing bullshit. What a waste of a short human life.

And yet some people dedicate

Doctor Cleveland — Mon, 05 Jan 2015 01:03:26 +0000

In reply to It often amazes me what some

And yet some people dedicate much of their lives to these nonsense theories. It's terribly sad.