The Shakespeare Oxford Society and the Shakespeare Fellowship Announce Details For Their 2013 Toronto Joint Conference, October 17 – 20

The theme of this year’s Shakespeare Authorship Conference is “Shakespeare and the Living Theatre.” It will be presented with support of the Theatre and Drama departments of York University and the University of Guelph, two major Canadian universities.

Conference organizer Professor Don Rubin of Toronto’s York University stated “The man who wrote under the name of Shakespeare, was clearly a man of the theatre. We know that William of Stratford had connections to the Globe but few people know that the 17th Earl of Oxford, also had significant theatre connections to both adult and children’s companies of the period.” “We are hoping that the Conference will offer new understandings of these connections as well as insights into theatrical conditions of the time and put to rest the idea that William of Stratford was the only candidate in the authorship debate with strong and profound theatrical involvement.”

There will be a variety of papers on related subjects presented as well as a trip to Canada’s internationally-acclaimed Stratford Festival to see a production of The Merchant of Venice, including a chance to meet and talk with the director of the production (and also the new Artistic Director of the Stratford Festival), Antoni Cimolino.

A preliminary list of speakers and topics is provided below:

Toronto Conference Schedule

                   The following program is subject to change.         

Thursday, 17 October   

    12:00-1:00   Registration

    1:00-1:15     Welcome. Opening of Conference.

    1:15-2:00      Shelly Maycock.  (Virginia)

                         “Essex, Oxford and the Concept of Popularity in Late Elizabethan

                         Discourse.”  How the notion of popularity can be recast from an 

                         Oxfordian perspective.

    2:00-2:45      Priscilla Costello.  (Ontario)

                         “Astrology Confirms de Vere.”   A professional astrologer compares the

                          astrological charts of de Vere and “Shakespeare.”

    2:45-3:30     Ron Halstead.  (Michigan)

                         “Death of a Dictator: The Dangerous Timeliness of Julius Caesar and

                          the Authorship Question.”  De Vere’s interest in rebellion.

    3:30-3:50    Coffee break

    3:50-4:35  Walter Hurst.  (North Carolina)

                           “What’s Your Authority for that Statement: An Approach to

                             Examining External Evidence in Early Modern Authorship.”

                             How to evaluate the strength of historical evidence.

    4:35-6:00         Video: The Naked Shakespeare

                           A new video on the authorship question from Germany.

 

Friday, 18 October 

     8:30-9:15       Ron Hess.  (Georgia)

                            “The Significant History of The Passionate Pilgrim.” Did this work

                              predate both Venus and Adonis and Rape of Lucrece?

     9:15-10:0        Heward Wilkinson.  (UK)

                            “Coleridge and the Implications of Authorial Self-Awareness in

                              Shakespeare.”   There is no sign that the Stratford man embodied

                              the consciousness of “Shakespeare” while there is substantial testimony

                              that Oxford did.

    10:45-10:45     Michael Egan. (New Mexico)

                            “The Shakespeare Grain Dealer Uproar.”  The documented facts about

                             Shakspere’s financial arrangements, when compared with the plays, show

                             clearly that we are dealing with two distinct individuals, the man from

                             Stratford and the man who wrote the plays.

    10:45 –11:05   Coffee Break

    11:05-11:50     Tom Regnier. (Florida)

                              “Could Ben Jonson Think Like A Lawyer? Taking a Closer

                               Look at Clarkson and Warren.”   A revaluation of the 1942 study on

                               property law in Elizabethan drama which disparages Shakespeare’s

                               legal knowledge.

    11:50-12:35      Earl Showerman. (Oregon)

                              “A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Shakespeare’s Aristophanic Comedy.”

                               Was Shakespeare acquainted with Athenian drama?  The former

                               President of the SF explores the territory.

                                Lunch on own

     3:00               Bus leaves for the Stratford Festival

                                (Tom Regnier paper on “The Law and Merchant” on bus)

     5:00               Arrive at Stratford.  Meeting with Antoni Cimolino (Director

                                of Merchant)  followed by “on own’ dinner                

      8:00               Merchant of Venice on Festival Stage                      

     10:30             Bus returns to Toronto (arrives about 12:30 a.m.)

 

Saturday, 19 October

            8:30-9:30      Annual Meeting of the Shakespeare Oxford Society

9:30-10:15     Cheryl Eagan-Donovan. (Massachusetts)

                         “The Reason for the Alias: Oxford’s Bisexuality and

                           the Elizabethan Theatre.”  A look at the sexual 

                           behavior of  bothactors and audiences of the

                           period suggests that Oxford’s Sexuality may have                                been a prime reason for the pseudonym.  

           

10:15-11:00    Hank Whittemore. (New York)

                                    “The Unbroken Line: Oxford, Acting Companies and the

                                    Phenomenon of Shakespeare.”  A look at de Vere as guiding

                                    force behind the three most important acting companies

                                    of Elizabeth’s reign.

11:00-11:15    The Missing Debate: A Comment. Don Rubin and Keir Cutler.

11:15-12:00      Roger Stritmatter (Maryland) and Lynne Kositsky (Ontario)

                         ‘Much Ado About Nothing: The Tempest Debate.” Two major

                         scholars put the Tempest dating debate to rest.    

            12:00-12:15       The Tempest Book launch/signing (Roger and Lynne)

           

12:15-1:45      Lunch (buffet with Keynote)

                        Mark Anderson (Massachusetts)

                        “Shakespeare, Newton and Einstein: Listening to the Obsession

                        of Genius.”  The author of the major de Vere biography, Shakespeare

                        By Another Name looks at the nature of genius and obsession.

 2:00-2:45        Robert Detobel/Henno Wember  (Germany)

                        “The Outcast State: Oxford’s Passion for the Theatre.”  Was it

                        his love of the theatre that led to Oxford’s “outcast state?”

 2:45 to 3:30    Keir Cutler (Quebec)

                         ‘From Crackpot to Mainstream: The Evolution of the Authorship

                        Question.”  Are the doubts about the man from Stratford becoming

                        mainstream? An actor suggests that the answer is “yes.”

3:30 to 4:15      Sky Gilbert (Ontario)

                         “Was Shakespeare A Euphuist?”  The connections between Shakespeare

                           and Lyly, between Endymion and Twelfth Night done with student actors. 

4:15 to 4:35      Coffee break

4:35 to 6:35    Canadian Premiere Screening: Last Will and Testament. 

Introduction of this full-length film by the directors – Lisa and Laura     Wilson.                                          

 

 Sunday, 20 October

 8:30-9:30         Annual Meeting of the Shakespeare Fellowship

 9:30-10:20       Ramon Jimenez (California)

                          ‘Shakespeare’s Two Lear Plays: How the Playwright Transformed His

                          First Romance into his Last Tragedy.”  From King Leir to King Lear.

10:20-11:20       Michael Morse. (Tennessee)

                           “What the Thunder Said and Tom O’Bedlam’s Song.”  Views of Lear.

11:20-12:15        Gerit Quealey. (New York)

                            “Studying Authorship: Why It Matters for Actors. The Road

                              To Revelation.”  How authorship research can inform and illuminate

                               A Text.” A working actor demonstrates her points with student actors.

12:15-2:00         Closing Banquet with Keynote.  Awards and Final words.

    John  Shahan (California).

    “The Shakespeare Authorship Coalition: Future Strategies.” The

    head of SAC and one of the editors of the volume Shakespeare Beyond

The conference will also include the annual general meetings of both organizations, which, because of the proposed unification of the two organizations, should not be missed.

The conference will be held at the Metropolitan Hotel in Toronto; registrants may receive a conference rate of $135/night at the hotel by calling 800-668-6600 or by e-mail at reservations@tor.metropoliton.com. Please mention Reservation ID#269-931 or the SOS or the SF. This hotel room rate will be good for up to three days before and after the conference for those who wish to extend their visit to Toronto. This rate is guaranteed for reservations made before September 17.

Transportation from the Toronto airport directly to the hotel can be obtained from Airport Express (905-564-6333 or http://www.torontoairportexpress.com). Rates are $27.95 one-way and $42.00 for round trip. There is a 5% discount for ordering online. There is a 10% senior and student discount for one-way only ($25) so this is not practical if you want a round trip.

Full registration for the conference includes all presentations and materials as well as lunch on Saturday and Sunday. Per day rates are also available. Registration is also possible onsite, including reduced daily rates for Saturday and Sunday that do not include lunch.

Please note, however, that the trip to Stratford may not be available for registrations received after September 15. 

For more conference information or to register for the conference, please visit www.Shakespeare-Oxford.com.

Required Reading! Diana Price, Author of Shakespeare’s Unorthodox Biography, Reviews Shakespeare Beyond Doubt Edited by Stanley Wells and Paul Edmondson

Everybody who is interested in the Shakespeare authorship question should read Diana Price’s entire review of Shakespeare Beyond Doubt.  I’m pasting below a long section from Diana Price’s review.  To read the entire review, please visit Diana’s website (http://www.shakespeare-authorship.com) or click on this link:  http://shakespeare-authorship.com/Articles/Shakespeare%20Beyond%20Doubt%20review%20website.htm.

A long section of Diana Price’s review follows.  I encourage you to read the entire review.  It’s well worth a careful read.

*****

i.

Shakespeare Beyond Doubt: Evidence, Argument, Controversy is a collection of essays that purports to put an end to the so-called Shakespeare Authorship Question, once and for all. Its editors, Stanley Wells and Paul Edmondson, recruited 20 contributors, most of whom also contributed to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust’s “60 Minutes with Shakespeare,” a project that provided 60 seconds each to 60 scholars addressing various topics, most with significance for the authorship question.

The essay collection was prompted in part by the release of Roland Emmerich’s 2011 film Anonymous (a box office flop dramatizing a fringe version of a “royal birth” theory positing the earl of Oxford as the real Shakespeare) and the “Declaration of Reasonable Doubt” (now signed by over 2,700 individuals) published on the website DoubtAboutWill. The substance of the Declaration is, in some measure, based on the research in my own book, Shakespeare’s Unorthodox Biography: New Evidence of An Authorship Problem. It was the first book challenging the traditional biography to be published by a mainstream publisher in a peer-reviewed series (Greenwood Press, 2001, “Contributions in Drama and Theatre Studies” no. 94; now revised and published in paperback by shakespeare-authorship.com, 2012). A major argument in the book is based on a comparative analysis of documentary evidence left behind by Shakespeare and two dozen writers active during his lifetime. The results of that analysis demonstrate that Shakespeare is the only alleged writer of consequence from the time period who left behind no evidence that he wrote for a living, or even as a vocation.

At the April 2013 launch of Shakespeare Beyond Doubt in Stratford-on-Avon, Ros Barber (author of the prize-winning The Marlowe Papers, a fictionalized case for Marlowe’s authorship) criticized the editors of the essay collection for failing to contend with their peer-reviewed opposition. In this review essay, I focus on particular contributors who defend the traditional biography, with the hope that my critique will move the debate forward.

As a general comment, it is unfortunate that a decision on nomenclature was made in this collection to re-label authorship skeptics as “anti-Shakespeareans,” rather than the more accurately descriptive “anti-Stratfordians. “Anti-Shakespearean” is unnecessarily pejorative (and it was a relief to read James Shapiro’s reversion to the term “anti-Stratfordian” in his Afterword). Also, in several places, some contributors assert that the authorship question first emerged, not during Shakespeare’s lifetime, but in 1856-57, when Delia Bacon published her unreadable tome (2, 87, 246). But Miss Bacon was not the first to ask questions about Shakespeare’s authorship. She was the first to formalize the question. Expressions of confusion about Shakespeare’s authorship were recorded during Shakespeare’s lifetime by Thomas Edwards, the Parnassus authors, Gabriel Harvey, and John Davies of Hereford, among others.

Now to particulars.

ii.

Andrew Hadfield is the author of the recent and well-received biography of Edmund Spenser. Spenser left behind good evidence of his literary interests and activities, the evidence that I call personal literary paper trails. These include books exchanged with his friend, Gabriel Harvey, his handwritten transcription of a Latin poem, and records of his education. Despite such evidence for Spenser, in his essay “Theorizing Shakespeare’s authorship,” Hadfield attempts to lower his reader’s expectations for evidence surviving for writers from the time period, essentially excusing the absence of literary paper trails for Shakespeare:

Even a superficial trawl through the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography will reveal how little we know about many important figures, making the gaps in the biographical records of Shakespeare seem typical rather than unusual and therefore in no need of explanation. . . What are left are scraps, fragments, and clues in parish registers, court records, and probate offices” (65, 66).

To which list I would add personal literary paper trails.

Hadfield admits that “there are virtually no literary remains left behind by Shakespeare” (66), but he also claims that in that sense, Shakespeare is no different than other writers, such as Henry Chettle, Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Middleton, Anthony Munday, and Thomas Nashe, among others (66). While the canons of these writers, like Shakespeare’s, present various attribution or authenticity problems, unlike Shakespeare, these writers left behind solid records of their activities as writers. To take one example (chosen here because Hadfield singled out Nashe in his 60 seconds contribution to the SBT program), among the personal literary paper trails for Nashe are an autograph poem from his days at Cambridge; a record of how much he was rewarded for writing by one of his patrons, as specified in a letter from Sir George Carey to his wife (the dedicatee of the pamphlet in question); and a letter to Carey’s servant describing his difficulties “writing for the stage and for the press.” Despite the survival of that letter, Hadfield claims that “personal letters did not survive in an age when paper was scarce and expensive” (64). Yet additional autograph letters DO survive for, among others, George Chapman, Ben Jonson, John Marston, and Michael Drayton, and all of them contain reference to literary topics (Price, Unorthodox, 314-18). There are no comparable records for Shakespeare, so Hadfield’s claims do not hold up. The deficiency of personal literary paper trails for a writer from the time period is not an expected or common phenomenon; the deficiency is unique to Shakespeare.

iii.

David Kathman’s essay “Shakespeare and Warwickshire” attempts to situate Shakespeare in the intellectual and literary communities in Stratford-on-Avon, investing him with intellectual credentials in a sort of literacy-by-association. Yet his sections on Shakespeare’s Stratford associates do nothing to establish Shakespeare as a man interested in literary matters. Identifying neighbors, such as Richard Quiney or Abraham Sturley, who read books or wrote letters, sometimes in Latin, is not evidence that Shakespeare read books or wrote letters. Indeed, the reason Kathman can state categorically that Quiney or Sturley read books or wrote letters is because letters survive to support those statements (124-27). No comparable evidence survives for Shakespeare.

Kathman claims that the plays “include numerous offhand references to people and places from the area around Stratford” (129). But those “numerous” Warwickshire characters and locations appear in only two plays, Henry IV (2) and The Taming of the Shrew. He further claims that the plays “are peppered with dialect words from Warwickshire and the West Midlands” (129). He cites three sources in his endnote, primarily C.T. Onions, and also R.C. Churchill (actually Ivor Brown’s introduction) and Hilda M. Hulme. Not only do these sources fail to verify all his claims, he omits other resources that would compromise or invalidate several of them. After consulting Joseph Wright’s still valuable six-volume The English Dialect Dictionary, James Orchard Halliwell’s Dictionary of Archaic Words, James Appleton Morgan’s Warwickshire Glossary, and the OED, I would propose that at least five of the nine words Kathman mentions don’t belong on his list.

For example, Kathman defines a “ballow” as a ‘cudgel,’ which Onions locates in the north Midlands (12). But the texts of King Lear (IV.vi.238) read, variously, “battero” (Qq), “bat” (Q1 and Q2), and “ballow” (F), so there is not even a secure basis for accepting “ballow” as the intended word. The OED elaborates:

Only in the Shakes. Folio of 1623, and subseq. editions, in loc. cit., where the Quartos have battero, and bat (stick, rough walking-stick); besides which, batton, battoun, ‘stick, cudgel’ obs. f. baton n. (q.v.) is a probable emendation. Bailey (1742) has ‘Ballow, a pole, a long stick, quarter-staff, etc. Shakesp.’ (quoted by Halliwell as ‘Northern’): but no such word seems to exist, or to have any etymological justification.

The Arden 2 editor goes with “ballow” and cites Wright’s entry (1:145) for the word as common to Nottinghamshire (Muir, 173; Wright also specifies the word as in use in the shire of Kent). The Arden 3 editor goes with “baton,” rejecting the Folio reading of “ballow” since he could find “no convincing parallels” (Foakes, 346).

According to Onions, “potch,” meaning to thrust, “survives in Warwickshire” (165). Wright lists the word “potch” as a variant form of “poach” (4:562), defines “poach” (and its variant spellings) as “to poke, esp. with the fingers; to thrust, push suddenly,” etc., and locates the variant “potch” not only in Warwickshire, but also in Staffordshire, Shropshire, and Gloucestershire. The Arden 2 editor of Coriolanus glosses potch as “jab, poke” but is silent on the matter of dialect (Brockbank, 149), as are the editors of recent Oxford and Cambridge editions, as well as Halliwell. Morgan’s Glossary contains neither “poach” nor “potch.”

The word “batlet,” meaning ‘club (for washing)’ is described by Onions as “current recently in Yorks[hire] and Warwick[shire] (13). “Batler” is in the OED with reference to the modified word “batlet” in modern editions of As You Like It, but no dialect is mentioned. The word in the Arden 2 edition of As You Like It (II.iv.46) reads “batler.” Halliwell lists “batler” but does not assign a shire of origin or use (149). The New Variorum editor (Knowles, 93) cites [John R.] Wise’s list of Warwickshire words, but also cites Wright, who specifies Yorkshire and Warwickshire (per Wise’s list) and adds a disclaimer: “not known to our correspondents in Warwickshire” (1:186). Morgan’s glossary contains only “batten,” defined as “a stick used in washing clothes” (76), but provides no examples in the Shakespeare canon.

At least two other words in Kathman’s list, “pash” and “tarre,” fare no better. Of the nine dialect words cited by Kathman, only four may withstand scrutiny. Kathman acknowledges that while the dialect words that he cites “don’t prove anything,” they are “consistent” with the Stratford man’s authorship (129). But they are not. In order to make that case, he would need to show  (1) that Warwickshire and West Midlands dialect words are particular to, or better yet, usually exclusive to, those shires, and  (2) that the Shakespeare canon contains disproportionately higher numbers of dialect words from those regions. When a word such as “batlet” is found in Yorkshire as well as (possibly) Warwickshire, Kathman’s argument is weakened. It is further diluted as the known use of a word is discovered in additional shires or regions. It is difficult to give credence to words that he claims as Warwickshire dialect, even those found in Onions’s Glossary, when there is no further support or corroboration from Halliwell, Morgan, the OED, various critical editions, or especially Wright.

It is puzzling that Kathman cites Hulme’s research in his endnote. Her examples of Warwickshire or Midlands dialects are either qualified or introduced as speculative. She also shares the skeptical opinion that future research will likely “establish as more widely current such elements of apparently ‘Stratford’ language as occur in his text” and cites G.D. Willcock’s opinion that the Shakespeare corpus “shows no sign of surviving local patriotism” (316, 315). Hulme cites some idiosyncratic Shakespearean spellings consistent with, if not unique to, Warwickshire spellings (316, 318), but some of her citations depend upon the unfounded assumption that the printing house’s orthography faithfully followed the author’s manuscript (the hypothetical ‘foul papers’), when spellings are more likely scribal, compositorial, or editorial.

The last section in Kathman’s chapter is about “Shakespeare and Stratford after 1616,” in which he claims that “a wealth of evidence from the decade after Shakespeare’s death illustrates Stratford’s fame” (130). That “wealth of evidence” is, by definition, posthumous. The first testimony in the historic record explicitly identifying Shakespeare of Stratford as the dramatist appeared in the 1623 First Folio, seven years after Shakespeare’s death. Kathman failed to establish any significant connection between the author of Shakespeare’s canon and Warwickshire during Shakespeare’s lifetime.

*****

To read the rest of Diana Price’s excellent, insightful, well-argued review of SBD, please click on this link:

http://shakespeare-authorship.com/Articles/Shakespeare%20Beyond%20Doubt%20review%20website.htm

Still Plenty Of Room For Doubt — “Macduff’s” Insightful Review On Amazon.com Of Shakespeare Beyond Doubt: Evidence, Argument, Controversy

The following review, penned by “Macduff,” is certainly worth reading.  Here’s the link:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A6LSWAP1OPLEB/ref=cm_pdp_rev_title_2?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview#R2AHSYAEJA9BMW

Review of Shakespeare Beyond Doubt: Evidence, Argument, Controversy by Stanley Wells and Paul Edmondson

This book’s overriding theme is that readers should stop thinking for themselves and accept the word of “authority” when it comes to the Shakespeare authorship question. It disparages open-mindedness, belittles its ideological adversaries, presupposes the truth of the thesis for which it is purportedly presenting evidence, ignores its most able opponents while making mincemeat of weaker opponents, dodges some of the most critical questions regarding the Shakespeare authorship question, and attempts to shame the reader away from even considering the possibility that the traditional authorship theory might be flawed. And yet this book accuses its opponents of being dogmatic and unreasonable.

Anonymity and use of pseudonyms were common among writers in Elizabethan times, when people could be punished for expressing views that offended the authorities. Furthermore, as George Puttenham wrote in 1589, many noblemen wrote literary works, including plays, but would not allow them to be published under their own names because writing for publication was regarded as beneath a nobleman’s dignity. Such facts make it reasonable to entertain the possibility that “William Shakespeare” was a pen name. Yet Shakespeare Beyond Doubt (SBD) summarily considers that hypothesis out of the question.

SBD never once mentions Diana Price’s seminal 2001 book, Shakespeare’s Unorthodox Biography: New Evidence of an Authorship Problem, which demonstrated that the Stratford man, whose name was spelled “William Shakspere,” left no literary paper trail during his lifetime: out of the 70 or so existing documents from the Stratford man’s life, not one identifies him personally as a writer of any kind or links him to the works published and performed under the name “William Shakespeare.” Price looked for a literary paper trail for 24 other Elizabethan writers and found evidence identifying each one personally as a writer during his lifetime, but found no such evidence for Shakspere.

But even though SBD doesn’t mention Price’s book, it more or less concedes her point. Stanley Wells admits in chapter 7 that no reference to the works of “William Shakespeare” before 1623, when the First Folio was published, explicitly identifies the writer with Stratford. SBD has no plausible explanation for the fact that the Stratford man’s death in 1616 was greeted by complete silence from the literary world, the nobility, and the public. Is it possible that no one at that time connected the Stratford man to the works of Shakespeare? Likewise, in chapter 6, Andrew Hadfield concedes that “there are virtually no literary remains left behind by Shakespeare outside his published works, and most of the surviving records deal with property and legal disputes.” Yet SBD insists that documentary evidence proves “beyond doubt” that the Stratford man was the true Bard.

While SBD ignores Price and other serious anti-Stratfordian scholars, such as George Greenwood, The Shakespeare Problem Restated, Mark Anderson, Shakespeare By Another Name, and Tony Pointon, The Man Who Was Never Shakespeare: The Theft of William Shakspeare’s Identity, it devotes three chapters to Delia Bacon, who wrote an unreadable book about the authorship controversy in the 19th century and later went mad. While no serious authorship skeptic of the past century relies on Delia Bacon’s work, she is an easy target for the authors of SBD. Its stratagem is to paint all doubters with the same brush as Delia Bacon and make the reader think that she epitomizes anti-Stratfordianism.

SBD categorically dismisses the idea of looking for a connection between the author’s life and his works. Matt Kubus in chapter 5 insists that there is no “inherent connection” between an author and “the content of his works.” While not all literature is thinly disguised autobiography, isn’t it reasonable to suppose that a writer might inadvertently reveal something about himself in the stories he chooses to tell? This should be an open question, one for debate and discussion, but the Stratfordians do not seem interested in discussion.

MacDonald P. Jackson in chapter 9 discusses stylometrics, the use of computer analysis of grammatical patterns and word usage, which allegedly shows that the Stratford man wrote the majority of Shakespeare’s plays with a little help from other playwrights of his time. But stylometrics is not a science: different stylometrics analyses come out with different answers as to who wrote what. Besides, the most that stylometric studies show is that the person who wrote the bulk of the plays (whoever that was) sometimes collaborated with others. They cannot prove that that central figure was the Stratford man because there is no known writing unquestionably belonging to the Stratford man to be used as a standard. Stylometrics may be a useful tool, but it cannot provide the total answer to the authorship question.

SBD never addresses the question of how the Stratford man acquired the vast knowledge of law, philosophy, classical literature, ancient and modern history, mathematics, astronomy, art, music, medicine, horticulture, heraldry, the military; etiquette and manners of the nobility; English, French and Italian court life; Italy; and aristocratic pastimes such as falconry, equestrian sports, and royal tennis, that is seen in the plays. Many books and articles have been written on Shakespeare’s intimate knowledge of these and other subjects. The author must have had extensive formal education, easy access to books, abundant leisure time to study on his own, and wide experience of the world gained through travel. This simply does not fit with the life of the Stratford man, who may or may not have had a few years of a grammar school education (documentary evidence is completely lacking on that subject), yet SBD makes no attempt to answer this anomaly.

Finally, and most disgracefully, SBD never ceases to use shaming techniques to frighten the reader away from questioning orthodoxy. One of its most unattractive ploys is to label anti-Stratfordians as “anti-Shakespearians.” As Edmondson and Wells explain in their introduction, the authors employ that word because “anti-Stratfordian . . . allows the work attributed to Shakespeare to be separated from the social and cultural context of its author.” How’s that for circular reasoning? It assumes that the Stratford man was the true author and implies that anyone who disagrees opposes the great playwright and all he stands for. Edmondson, in chapter 19, says that “open-mindedness” is merely a rhetorical maneuver and should be allowed only after the evidence for Shakespeare has been disproven, not (as Edmondson says) “merely ignored.” If Edmondson had read the better anti-Stratfordian writers, he would know that they have not ignored the evidence; rather, they have examined it and found serious flaws in it. “There is, too,” says Edmondson, “the loaded assumption that even though one may lack the necessary knowledge and expertise, it is always acceptable to challenge or contradict a knowledgeable and expert authority. It is not.”

That is the message of SBD: don’t question the authorities, who know better than you; don’t be open-minded; don’t read anti-Stratfordian books because you’ll go mad like Delia Bacon. It is an attempt to lull the reader into drowsy acceptance of authority. I hope that readers of SBD will resist its call for intellectual servitude, will explore the subject on their own, and will reach their own conclusions. Any reader who likes to hear both sides of an argument before making up his or her mind is encouraged to read Shakespeare Beyond Doubt? — Exposing an Industry in Denial.