BOOKS SHAKESPEARE: Who Wrote Shakespeare? by John Michell
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Who Wrote Shakespeare? by John Michell, Thames & Hudson pounds 16.95. The Man from Stratford left not a single manuscript, literary relic, or even a book in his will; his tomb effigy originally clutched a sack (the quill-pen was added during 18th-century renovations); his death, unlike those of Jonson, Spenser, Fletcher and Chapman, inspired no public lamentation or dedicatory verses. Afterwards, no one thought to interview his surviving relatives. Records left by his friends and collaborators are frustratingly opaque, but then we are dealing with the greatest riddlers, wits and punsters of the age, or of any age. Ben Jonson wrote a fulsome elegy for the First Folio, unhesitatingly attributing the plays to the Man from Stratford (here called Shakspere), but even this is full of ambiguities. "Thou Starre of poets", Jonson called him, but Poet + aster (Greek for star) = Poetaster. Other oddities outlined, if not resoved, in this hugely entertaining and non-committal survey include: the status of the "birthplace" (the Trust was once sued under the Trades Description Act); the Stratford cult ("a pious fraud"); the clues in the plays (was Shaggers a lawyer, a seaman or a soldier?); the other candiates - Oxford, Marlowe, Bacon, Queen Elizabeth I, ad infinitum; and whether the Droeshout portrait in the First Folio shows two left arms and a mask. So do the Stratfordians have a case to answer? Undoubtedly. There's something here to amuse, infuriate and perplex even the most devout Bardolater.
Right: Henry VIII staged in 1831, taken from The Oxford Illustrated History of Theatre, ed John Russell Brown, pounds 25
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments