Posted: 03 February 2021 at 5:18pm | IP Logged | 1
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Peter: The essay is good at raising questions, which is never hard to do. It's less convincing at making a positive case.
Prodromou remarks in his essay that: "Any evidence we have for the actual existence of the Stratford man as Writer (as opposed to him as Man-of-the-Theatre) always seems to be hedged with both doubts and ambiguities", but this attempt to draw a distinction between Will of Stratford and Shakespeare, the pseudonym supposedly used by another writer, simply doesn't work.
We know The King's Men acted the plays ascribed to Shakespeare in the First Folio.
We know that in the royal patent of 1603, Shakespeare's name is second in the list, alongside Burbage, Heminges and Condell.
We know that when Shakespeare (or Shakspeare) of Stratford died, he left small bequests to Burbage, Heminges and Condell.
We know that Heminges and Condell collected the plays to commemorate the memory of the man they'd known - William Shakespeare.
As I've posted above, the odds of the Burbage, Heminges, and Condell in Shakspere's will not being the same Burbage, Heminges and Condell in the patent are astronomical, and must run to millions, or perhaps even billions, to one.
It beggars belief that Stratford feigned being a writer for decades, and did so so convincingly that for years after his death, his deceived colleagues undertook the project of collecting the plays that became the First Folio.
The alternative is that there was a conscious and deliberate attempt to make it seem that Stratford was indeed the author, and it became necessary to maintain this pretence years after any parties who could have been damaged by the truth coming to light were dead. And if it is the case that Stratford was a front-man, why do alternative authorship theorists, particularly Oxfordians, make snide jibes about how illiterate he was? Their argument is surely contingent upon him having to have been, if not a literary genius, at least literate, in order to have presented a convincing facade.
I reckon this threat has pretty much worn itself out! :) Time for the mods to lock, and we all move on?
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