And if that warn't inflammatory enough. . . .

[shalanna]

Somebody is AGAIN claiming Shakespeare didn't write Shakespeare. AAAARGGGHHHHH

"Extraordinary historical evidence suggests Shakespeare's plays were not written by the bard, but by Sir Henry Neville, a Tudor politician descended from King Edward III."

At least they're not trying to make it be Bacon or Marlowe again. The research was done by British Shakespeare scholar and former university lecturer Brenda James and university historian William Rubinstein, and is being applauded (apparently) by the chairman of the Shakespearean Authorship Trust. Now, I don't know whether that's a famous anti-Stratfordian league or not, but anyhow, we'll have to see what they gots (as the kids say.) I still think that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare. I mean . . . really, I do.

But I couldn't resist shining a flashlight on the article. This definitely is not the first time that somebody's worked up a case against the Bard. But the others have not held up for me. So what do they have--the guy's LiveJournal where he confesses to being the real author? (grin)

Comments

[elsbet-vance.livejournal.com]

I don't even begin to understand why they care who wrote the plays. SOMEONE wrote them. Why not just go with the evidence, that the guy who SAID he wrote them, signed his name to them, wrote them?

[shalanna.livejournal.com]

Well . . . it's been a continuing controversy. Their argument is that Shakespeare quit school when he was twelve, but the plays indicate a rather knowledgeable and erudite type of guy wrote them. There's a lot of history, a lot of court etiquette, and so forth. (There are a few geographical errors, though.) They just don't wanna think that he could have written them . . . the same way some of the power-guys here and now don't think that a woman from SMU could be a good Supreme Court justice . . . because they think that ONLY someone from their big-time Eastern universities should be in a position of power. *oops* The vibe is kind of similar, I think. *grin* There's this feeling that hey, this guy could not know all this stuff because he wasn't a university graduate, etc. It's sort of an elitist deal.

I'm with the bunch who says it doesn't matter who wrote them, because it's the plays themselves that are fascinating and deep and study-able. Just assume that the same person wrote them and call him Shakespeare. (grin)

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Here's my post on the matter. I think the whole thing is silly.

(And I do find it amusing that all these articles highlight Neville's descent from Edward III. After all, it's not like descendants of Edward III were particularly rare among the nobility. The man did have something like 20 kids, most of them even legitimate.)