Shakespeare was a fraud

[Zinneke]

Discuss the theories that say he didn't write his plays.

[Cassius]

Mark Rylance should be fired into the sun.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

What is there to discuss? Should we do a thread about 9/11 conspiracies too?

[Geoffrey Howe]

Amusingly, several US Supreme Court Justices believed in the Oxfordian theory, or at least expressed significant doubt about the traditional view.

There was even a moot court over the question held by Justices Brennan, Blackmun and Stevens.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

The impression I get is that it all boils down to a cluster of snobby upper-class people who refuse to believe that the foremost English literary genius was a commoner. No reputable scholar takes this theory seriously anymore, and it is even more baseless than the usual conspiracy theories about aliens or the Kennedy assassination.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

It seems to be a mixture of aforementioned snobbery and that weird belief that writers can only write things from their direct experience. Shakespeare seemed to live a rather mundane life of a provincial well off commoner, which astounds people who want their writers to be huge personalities who draw their own messy life into the script.

I feel that the nature of writing plays for a specific theatre company that the author would know intimately means there would be a lot of strange logical leaps to claim that the author was in fact some distant aristocrat.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

It seems to be a mixture of aforementioned snobbery and that weird belief that writers can only write things from their direct experience. Shakespeare seemed to live a rather mundane life of a provincial well off commoner, which astounds people who want their writers to be huge personalities who draw their own messy life into the script.

I feel that the nature of writing plays for a specific theatre company that the author would know intimately means there would be a lot of strange logical leaps to claim that the author was in fact some distant aristocrat.

Shakespeare should have stayed in his lane and only wrote about cloth merchants.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Amusingly, several US Supreme Court Justices believed in the Oxfordian theory, or at least expressed significant doubt about the traditional view.

Yes, because the typical SCOTUS justice is an Optimate first and a liberal or a conservative or whatever second.

Anti-Stratfordianism is close to being the thinking man's Flat Earth in terms of the level of support for it, and it says some very bad things about the level of snobbery and deference to the rich and famous in Anglophone societies that we don't see the same sort of theories about great commoners in other literatures like Cervantes (a New Christian son of a barber-surgeon who was briefly enslaved) or Boccaccio (a bastard child of some merchant).

[Geoffrey Howe]

Amusingly, several US Supreme Court Justices believed in the Oxfordian theory, or at least expressed significant doubt about the traditional view.

Yes, because the typical SCOTUS justice is an Optimate first and a liberal or a conservative or whatever second.

Anti-Stratfordianism is close to being the thinking man's Flat Earth in terms of the level of support for it, and it says some very bad things about the level of snobbery and deference to the rich and famous in Anglophone societies that we don't see the same sort of theories about great commoners in other literatures like Cervantes (a New Christian son of a barber-surgeon who was briefly enslaved) or Boccaccio (a bastard child of some merchant).

I haven't looked into the matter so I can't comment with any great insight. However it seems possible to me that they are not so much projecting their own snobbishness but trying to apply the norms of English society at the time. Or perhaps it is the judge's more discriminating eye for detail shining through? I do not know.

Historically England has had a rather less hierarchical and illiberal society than, say, France. Do not Shakespeare's origins actually speak more about "Anglophone society"* than some critics'? Molière and Corneille did not have humble origins. And if all reputable people dismiss the Oxfordian theory what is there to complain about?

*A frankly idiotic phrase which could have come from a narrow-minded Frenchman, given how different Britain and America are; especially on issues of class.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Amusingly, several US Supreme Court Justices believed in the Oxfordian theory, or at least expressed significant doubt about the traditional view.

Yes, because the typical SCOTUS justice is an Optimate first and a liberal or a conservative or whatever second.

Anti-Stratfordianism is close to being the thinking man's Flat Earth in terms of the level of support for it, and it says some very bad things about the level of snobbery and deference to the rich and famous in Anglophone societies that we don't see the same sort of theories about great commoners in other literatures like Cervantes (a New Christian son of a barber-surgeon who was briefly enslaved) or Boccaccio (a bastard child of some merchant).

I haven't looked into the matter so I can't comment with any great insight. However it seems possible to me that they are not so much projecting their own snobbishness but trying to apply the norms of English society at the time. Or perhaps it is the judge's more discriminating eye for detail shining through? I do not know.

Historically England has had a rather less hierarchical and illiberal society than, say, France. Do not Shakespeare's origins actually speak more about "Anglophone society"* than some critics'? Molière and Corneille did not have humble origins. And if all reputable people dismiss the Oxfordian theory what is there to complain about?

*A frankly idiotic phrase which could have come from a narrow-minded Frenchman, given how different Britain and America are; especially on issues of class.

I'm not particularly invested in my hot-take "cultural" interpretation above so I'm happy to concede to your refutation of it. I am, however, committed to the view that the popularity of anti-Stratfordianism among groups of people like the federal judiciary says more about attitudes towards class and its relationship to artistic talent among those groups in particular than you seem to be arguing it does.

I also don't at all agree that it's "idiotic" to treat the UK, the US, ANZ, etc. as a sociocultural unit, at least for some purposes. Whether this is one of those purposes or not is, again, something I'm happy to concede for now.

[Georg Ebner]

Absurdest is the F.BACON-HypoThesis. But one has to understand the situation of the XIXth.
German romanticism had brought the big revolution in hermeneutics, wonderfully described by W.DILTHEY: Viewing the work no longer for its own sake as had happened in classicism; instead the work being an ExPression of the author like the petrified lava of a volcano. The historian going back from external facts/works into the internal thoughts&emotions of the creators. What establishing serious HistorioGraphy, was at the same time misled by GOETHE, as the romanticists thought, that all poets, painters, composers must have lived a great, symbolic life as the overwhelming giant did directly in front of their noses. Only after lots of failed BioGraphies realizing, that most poets - let alone painters or composers - had expressed themselves mainly/only in great poetry, not in a great private life.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

No, the most absurd hypothesis is that Edmund Spenser faked his death and continued to write under the pseudonym of William Shakespeare. Of all the potential alt-Shakespeares, Oxford is the only plausible one and even the case for him isn't persuasive.

[Georg Ebner]

No, the most absurd hypothesis is that Edmund Spenser faked his death and continued to write under the pseudonym of William Shakespeare. Of all the potential alt-Shakespeares, Oxford is the only plausible one and even the case for him isn't persuasive.

From a non-literarical point of view a faked death is indeed "the most absurd hypothesis". But otherwise E.SPENSER with His harmless "FairyQueen" aso. is less absurd than F.BACON, whose whole PhiloSophy was really farest away from S..

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, it's the sort of argument you could only believe if you had never actually bothered to find out what Bacon thought and believed.

[Zinneke]

What is there to discuss? Should we do a thread about 9/11 conspiracies too?

Well 9/11 conspiracy theories are understandable as a phenomenon due to the political context, the rise of the internet, the Bush government's shadiness, idiocracy, etc.

How is it that the Shakespeare authorship debate became this subject that is routinely taught and analyzed, with seemingly well educated figures coming out in favour of the idea? Is it that very British academic trend of wanting to be interesting rather than right? or is it just boredom?

[Statilius the Epicurean]

How is it that the Shakespeare authorship debate became this subject that is routinely taught and analyzed, with seemingly well educated figures coming out in favour of the idea? Is it that very British academic trend of wanting to be interesting rather than right? or is it just boredom?

I think you're mistaken about the level of support the conspiracy theory has. No serious scholar (in academia or elsewhere) has ever supported it.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Support for it largely reflects social snobbery, a fundamentally conspiratorial worldview (this is why so many well-known actors have believed it), or a combination of the two (this is why so many American Supreme Court Justices have believed it).

[NOVA Green]

Amazed that Titus Andronicus hasn't yet been mentioned.

Been a long time since I have seen it live on stage, but it is not only Shakespeare's first and very stylistically from many of his later works but also been long a subject of contention among experts on the topic.

A lot of that argument boils down to obscure theories of:

Prose-Play-Ballad
Prose-Ballad-Play
Play-Ballad-Prose
Play-Prose-Ballad


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titus_Andronicus

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Yes, it's the sort of argument you could only believe if you had never actually bothered to find out what Bacon thought and believed.

You mean "more things in heaven and earth, Horatio" and "to hound nature in its wanderings" don't seem like they were written by the same person to you?? Al, you need to open your mind to what's REALLY going on; don't trust the system, maaaan!

[Orthogonian Society Treasurer]

The only true Shakespeare theory is that he really did write Vortigern and Rowena but y'all aren't ready for that conversation.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

The only true Shakespeare theory is that he really did write Vortigern and Rowena but y'all aren't ready for that conversation.

That theory is only relevant in Ireland.