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The Case for Shakespeare: The End of the Authorship Question

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McRae ably gathers and cogently explains the certainty that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare. The external evidence is overwhelming. The works were attributed to him in his time by people who knew him and the theatre scene, like Ben Jonson. The internal evidence - trying to infer biography from the works - matches Shakespeare far better than any other candidate. Just think about the preoccupation with retirement, restoration, and father daughter relationships in plays near the end of his career. For a more recent stone cold demonstration, see James Shapiro latest.

Oh, wait a minute. I forgot. Dame Sybil Puffenpough's latest work, "Cyril Shlabotnik and the Bard" definitely proves, despite the apparent evidence to the contrary, that a emigre Pole posing as an exiled Welshman composed not only Shakespeare, but Winnie the Pooh, Deuteronomy and Mad Men. I refuse to read any book that does not contend seriously with this theory.

Scott McCrea's THE CASE FOR SHAKESPEARE: THE END OF THE AUTHORSHIP QUESTION thoughtfully and brilliantly erases all doubt as to the authorship of Shakespeare's plays. A must read for anyone interested in Western culture and literature and the nature of genius. Highly recommended!

McCrea does a better job than Irvin Matus (Shakespeare In Fact), but, in the final analysis, McCrea lacks depth, depends upon well-worn foundational assumptions that he uncritically accepts, and introduces a good deal of his own conjecture to solve long-standing problems with the Stratfordian Tradition.

I'm afraid Mr. McCrea has not brought an End to the Authorship Question, despite the subtitle of his book.

For those unfamiliar with this literary backwater it's instructive to ask why there is an Authorship Question in the first place since a reading of almost any biography would lead one to believe we have good reason to be certain of much of the life and career trajectory of possibly the most gifted writer of all time.

In a nutshell, there is an Authorship Question because none of the roughly 70 incontrovertible, contemporaneous documented facts concerning the life of William Shakspere (sic) of Stratford-on-Avon link him to any literary activity whatsoever. None. Not one.

There are people who have other reasons for doubt but forget conspiracy theories, forget aristocratic or middle class contenders, forget snobbery, forget all the usual suspects. A very sound reason for questioning Stratfordian orthodoxy is that it is grounded in ambiguity, conjectures, tradition and legends.

Mr. McCrea provides a familiar response to the lack of documented facts regarding Shakspere's connection to literature when he says (p. 51): "We know less about Marlowe, Kydd, Dekker, Heywood, Fletcher or Webster - to name just a few."

That is just not true. We have evidence, from their lifetimes, of the profession of all those authors. Such evidence consists of various combinations of the following, all of which are missing for Shakspere of Stratford on Avon: evidence of education, evidence of being paid to be a writer, evidence of direct relationship with a patron, handwritten inscriptions or letters touching on literary matters, notice at death as a writer etc. etc.

As an analogy, contemporary evidence proves Mark Twain was Samuel Clemens but Shakespeare only equals Shakspere if we have literary evidence from Shakspere's lifetime. I stress his lifetime because that's the evidence we use for Marlowe, Kydd, Dekker, Heywood, Fletcher, Webster et al. We don't believe they were writers because someone told stories or made ambiguous statements about them years after their deaths. We know they were writers because of contemporaneous literary evidence, and if the case for the authorship of the works of Shakespeare is to be incontrovertible, it should provide the same kind of proof.

Or, as others have put the question: "Suppose that the works of William Shakespeare had been attributed to "Anonymous" for over 400 years. What personal evidence is there from the lifetime of William Shakspere of Stratford on Avon that he, rather than Anonymous, should be the rightful author?"

This is not an unreasonable question to ask, and step one in answering it is to be clear that references to Shakespeare the author are not necessarily references to Shakspere the man. (I forget where I saw this but one source, not from Mr. McCrea's book, says something to the effect of "We know Shakespeare wrote the works because his name is on the book.")

Could Shakspere from Stratford have written the works of Shakespeare? OF COURSE HE COULD HAVE, but without contemporary evidential proof, what evidence is there to believe he did?

Essentially Mr. McCrea would have us believe that Anonymous is the Stratford businessman because of the same pieces of evidence every biography provides:

1. Ben Jonson's preface to the First Folio referencing Sweet Swan of Avon and Stratford monument

2. The bust in the church of Stratford

3. Greene's reference to an Upstart Crow in his (Chettle's?) Groatsworth of Wit.

4. Interlineations in the will that connect to First Folio material.

Copious sources show that each of these arguments has serious flaws, which Mr. McCrea does not do a good job of dispelling.

It would take more space than is available to do justice to why each of his arguments falls on shaky ground but making the claim that Shakspere would have to be Anonymous because

(a) Ben Jonson provides an ambiguous and posthumous link between Stratford and the river Avon

(b) there's a posthumous bust in the church with references to Nestor and Socrates (neither of whom had anything to do with dramatic literature), and Virgil who was not one of Shakespeare's principal sources

(c) an actor was accused of implying that he (the actor) was a playwright
(d) the will is of someone who undoubtedly had associations with the theatre (as an actor, playwright, owner?)

is hardly compelling evidence.

To repeat my point - all orthodox biographies make the same assumption i.e. a reference to Shakespeare the writer is, ipso facto, a reference to the man from Stratford. THOSE BIOGRAPHIES COULD BE RIGHT - but where's the evidence? Why are no references made to him as an author before his death? Why did his son-in-law, John Hall, a prolific diarist, not mention his father-in-law once in his writings? Why in the First Folio, on the bust in the church or on the gravestone (which has no name on it at all) is there no statement, or variation thereof, to the effect "William Shakespeare, born in Stratford, baptised 23 (?) April 1564; died 23 April 1616, author and poet."
There could be very good answers to all of these questions, but Mr. McCrea fails to address them.

Postscript:
I use the spelling "Shakspere" to denote the man, whom we know was born in Stratford, for two reasons - it's one of the variations on the spelling of his name and it serves to make the distinction, so often blurred, between the man and the author. There is absolutely no evidence that the man from Stratford spelled his name "Shakespeare". As such this proves absolutely nothing regarding the Authorship Question because there was no standardized spelling at that time.
I have absolute respect for those who oppose my views. If you wish to disagree, please do without resorting to ad hominem attacks.

Who wrote Shakespeare's plays? This quesion seems to belong in the same category as "Who's buried in Grant's tomb?" Yet the authorship question has gathered momentum lately, perhaps driven by the fashion for celebrity scandal.

McCrea takes apart the various theories about who wrote Shakespeare's plays by helping us get to know the person who did: William Shakespeare himself. Most of the theories favoring other authors start with the assumption that Shakespeare could never have written these wonderful plays, because he was poorly educated, little travelled, unfamiliar with royalty, or whatever. Yet as McCrea sifts through the historical record and the plays themselves, Shakespeare emerges as the most likely answer, as well as the most obvious.

As with most conspiracy theories, those who favor other authors filter facts to fit. McCrea exposes these biases in their evidence in a way that less balanced, more sensational accounts omit.

Beyond the authorship question, the book provides an excellent sense of Shakespeare himself, and the world and times in which he lived. Further, McCrea's writing, while clearly well researched, avoids becoming stuffy or pedantic. Instead, he shares his expertise and passion for the subject in this enjoyable and interesting book.

McCrea writes (p.216): "Denial of Shakespeare follows exactly the same flawed reasoning as Holocaust denial, though it obviously lacks the same moral dimension." To even mention Holocaust denial and the Shakespeare authorship question in the same sentence is really offensive.

That aside, ... McCrea's argument in favour of Shakespeare of Stratford is that nothing known about him truly rules him out as the author and that his authorship does, as such, offer the most straightforward answer to the authorship question. His critique of the Oxfordian case is to the point, but his discussion of the Marlovian case misses the point.

George Puttenham (Art of English Poesie 1589) and Robert Greene (Farewell to Folly 1591) both indicate that ambitious courtiers published anonymously or under a mask. So the fact that Shakspere had his name on the work is no demonstration of authorship. There is no record of Shakspere's education, no record of his having used a passport (and familiarity with the French Court is requisite for Love Labour's Lost), his will shows no concern for the 18 still unpublished plays (and surely with a family to support, he didn't simply hand over the rights to the King's Men), he cannot be convincingly connected with the details of any of the plays and it is unlikely that a man of his rank could have attracted Southampton's patronage for Venus and Adonis (1593) less than five years from his first writing. He wasn't at Gray's Inn for the first known performance of Comedy of Errors, and because the Inns of Court excluded non members at the time, he could not have got a play acted there. Indeed, the Gesta Grayorum indicates it was written as part of the 1594-5 revels and so was by an Inns of Court member. If you take his name off the work the only evidence in his favour is a cryptic tribute by Ben Jonson in the First Folio (1623) and one from Heminge and Condell his fellow players who make it clear they want people to buy the First Folio! Sorry, but you need to look a bit deeper below the surface!

If you're looking to buy one book setting forth the "orthodox" view for Shakespeare's authorship, this is it. Does for the Authorship Question what Gerald Posner did for the Kennedy Assassination in "Case Closed." McCrea patiently sets forth the (overwhelming) affirmative, documentary evidence that the Shakespearean Canon was indeed penned by the man from Stratford who had "small Latin and less Greek," and establishes how suporters of the other candidates -- Bacon, Oxford, et al. -- have nothing by way of positive evidence -- absolutely nothing --to support their claims. The lay public (and even a couple Supreme Court justices) have unwittingly been conned by a few clever Oxfordians into thinking there is a "controversy" over the authorship; if they only understood that the "controversy" is wholly dependent on swallowing far-fetched conspiracy theories (e.g., the First Folio was a hoax, the Stratford monument was planted physical evidence), they would quickly revert to accepting what has been accepted, for centuries, by reputable scholars and historians. While treating the heretics with respect (more than they deserve), McCrea calls them on their conspiracy theories. As McCrea writes, they refuse to put two and two together because they do not like four. But four (and Shakespeare of Stratford) it is. Case closed.

This book spouts the same old arguments that have been used by "orthodox" scholars for decades. Unfortunately, there is nothing new - no new insights, no new evidence, nothing. By labeling authorship doubters "heretics", the author betrays his belief that Shaksper of Stratford is a God and one MUST believe in him by faith. What a shame. No need to buy this book - it's just the same regurgitated information you can find in any encyclopedia.

The world does not need yet another book about the dispute between the Oxfordians and Stratfordians. Anyone interested in the authorship question should read "Sweet Swan of Avon" by Williams. Ms Williams does not take a position, but does gather enough information about Mary Sidney Herbert, the Countess of Pembroke and mother of the sponsors of the First Folio, to lead anyone with an open mind to one inescapable conclusion. Mary Sidney was at least as talented as her brother Philip, and was the author of nearly all of the works attributed to Shakespeare. Shapiro does not even comment on Mary Sidney's authorship, in his recent polemic, but merely states that his arguments in favor of Shakespeare the man will apply with equal force against all other potential authors. I wasted money on the Shapiro book, and will not waste money on another tome on the authorship question until the qualifications of Mary Sidney are examined. I would welcome an honest evaluation of the Williams book, but I have not yet found any scholar who has seriously examined the question of Mary Sidney's authorship. [[ASIN:0321426401 Sweet Swan of Avon: Did a Woman Write Shakespeare?]