Total TV and the Top 5

Tip o' the hat to fellow heretic Alex McNeil, former president of the Shakespeare
Fellowship, who in yesterday's online edition of the Boston Globe did an interview/live chat about his two favorite subjects: Television and Edward de Vere. McNeil is the author of one of the best encyclopedic guides to the 60-year history of American TV shows, Total Television.

He covers some of the essential arguments for de Vere capably and succinctly. (And he gives good ink... er... pixel... to a book we're particularly fond of here.)

asibtroy__Guest_: What are the top 5 reasons you can give that Oxford wrote the plays?

Alex_McNeil: Interesting question.
Alex_McNeil: 1. He was recognized during his lifetime as a poet and playwright (even an "excellent" one), yet no plays, and few poems, exist under his name.
Alex_McNeil: 2. His life fits the plays in uncountable ways. I would refer you to Mark Anderson's "Shakespeare by Another Name" for a detailed examination. But take Hamlet. Hamlet's mother remarried quickly after Claudius's death; Oxford's mother remarried quickly after the 16th earl's death. Polonius is generally agreed to be caricature of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Elizabeth's chief adviser. Oxford grew up in Burghley's household. Ophelia is Polonius's daughter, and Hamlet's love interest. Oxford was married to Cecil's daughter, Anne. (Ophelia = O + philia, or "Oxford's love").
Alex_McNeil: 3. The First Folio (1623) is dedicated to two lords, Montgomery and Pembroke, who no doubt financed the project. One was Oxford's son-in-law, the other had been engaged to another of Oxford's daughters.
Alex_McNeil: 4. Shakespeare "thinks like a lawyer," i.e., he has legal training and uses legal terms with ease, when referring to legal matters and in other ways as well. Oxford was trained in law, having spent at least a year at Gray's Inn.
Alex_McNeil: 5. Back to Hamlet -- Rosenkrantz & Guildenstern are two minor characters. Oxford's brother-in-law went on a dioplomatic mission to Denmark, and wrote of it upon his return. Among the guests at the state dinner were Messrs. Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern. Yes, those names do appear elsewhere, but the frequency of such coincidences cannot be explained by chance.

Bard without Baggage

Dateline: Taipei. Four out of five stops into the "Shakespeare" By Another Name mini-tour of Taiwan, it is safe to report a vast potential audience here for an alternative theory of Shakespeare—such as, oh, say, the Oxfordian one. The English/Foreign Language and Literature departments at three Taiwanese universities (listed below) have all graciously hosted talk(s) by yours truly, unfolding the case for Edward de Vere as "Shakespeare" as might a prosecuting attorney in the courtroom. (Although at the risk of sounding grandiose, this prosecutor has cooler-looking graphics than most.)

Each of the four lectures—and one-on-one discussions throughout this visit—have been particularly noteworthy for the rationality with which the faculty, undergraduate and graduate students approached this topic. Of course of course of course there are many (though not enough) English profs and college/grad students today in the States and the U.K. who keep an open mind toward Edward de Vere and the authorship issue. But I have yet to find a college or university English department in an English-language-native country where there aren't also card-carrying members of the Unhinge Me Here contingent.*

"Unhinge Me Here"-ers can be any class, creed, political persuasion, sex or age. Their chief distinguishing characteristic is to transform, wolfman-like, from a sane and reasonable person into a snarling and/or awkwardly grinning bearer of impatient discomfort. Mention any two or more of the following words in the same sentence, and an Unhinger will suddenly see you as little more than an annoying pebble in their shoe: Authorship question, Oxfordian, Earl of Oxford, [insert name of other alternative Shakespeare candidate here], anti-Stratfordian, Shaksper, the Stratford man.



This irrational, hackles-up response to the Oxfordians and other "Shakespeare wasn't Shakespeare" types stems, no doubt, from the exalted place that Shakespeare today sits in English-speaking cultures. His words are the closest our language will probably ever get to (apologies to Peggy Noonan) slipping those surly bonds of Earth to touch the face of God. And the Horatio Alger myth that traditionally accompanies the story of the man who allegedly wrote these words is really hard for some people to even consider letting go of.

But it's not so—or at least not nearly so much—in a culture that appreciates and studies English but doesn't worship at any of our secular altars. Shakespeare is, to some in Taiwan, a status symbol. (Akin to a Mercedes Benz, one prof here wryly noted.) But, even then, that status is conferred no matter who he was.

I have long suspected that some of the greatest contributions to the Shakespeare authorship debate will be coming from countries that have no traditions of Bardolatry to overcome. Expect more from this island nation in the coming years.


(*P.S. Ooop. Just thought of one. Concordia University in Portland, Oregon: The exception that proves the rule!)

Taiwan On

As the Taiwan-based blogger Nostalgiphile recently wrote, "Taiwanese literature departments seem to be hell bent on carving a niche for themselves in the fascinating field of Renaissance studies." Shakespeare, specifically.

Although Nostalgiphile has his own take on the relevance and appropriateness of the Bard-centric English departments in Taiwan, which seems to open up a whole different discussion/can o' worms, I can only say this much: This blogger will next week be able to report first-hand on how the Bard is taught and received on the island the Portuguese christened Formosa (i.e. "Beautiful"). The "Shakespeare" By Another Name mini-tour of Taiwan will be occupying this page for the next fortnight or so.

With a genuflecting bow to my hosts at Tamkang University and a grateful tip of the hat to the two other universities where I will also be speaking (Soochow University and National Ilan University), I sign off from one side of the International Date Line and look forward to approaching Shakespeare, Edward de Vere, and the authorship question from an entirely new vantage.

Playgoers and their Playthings

It was inevitable. The New York Times posted a brief story by William S. Niederkorn on the state of the Shakespeare authorship debate on Sunday, and the fact that the paper devoted column inches to this widely-dismissed topic is now fuel for a prominent theater blogger's ire.

Having seen Stratfordian ... er, excuse (the blogger in question finds the term objectionable)... orthodox ire in its more unhinged forums (who ever thought the Virginia Tech slayings could, however tortuously, be linked to "Shakespeare deniers"?), I can at least applaud "Playgoer" for not calling for Niederkorn's diesmbowelment. Huzzah.

In short, as "Playgoer" notes with heaving sigh over having to actually touch keys on his keyboard in response to complete lunatics:

"Who else but an amateur zealot would even ask such bullshit questions? ... The scandal is not really why this one individual thinks what he does --but why the New York Times continues to legitimize his unsubstantiated insinuations against, effectively, the entire community of professional literary scholars, critics, and historians."

"Playgoer" gives us links to his previous rants against Niederkorn and the Oxfordians, so I won't waste pixels recapitulating his arguments against the heretics. (Hint: That desperate, sweaty-palmed analogy to Holocaust deniers gets trotted out just like Godwin's Law mandates.)

But the ultimate gist of "Playgoer"'s argument is self-evidently absurd, especially given his own profession: As links on his blog reveal, he's a drama critic for the Village Voice. If the job of an arts section is to always and unfailingly toe the majority-rules party line, then "Playgoer" had better forget championing those brilliant off-off-Broadway productions that may be life-transforming but would never pack in one-tenth of the warm bodies that a Les Miz Sunday matinee brings in.

Niederkorn is not running with the pack on his occasional assignments outside the walls of traditional Shakespeare scholarship. No denying it: The authorship skeptics are not mainstream, nor could his laudable coverage be accused of portraying it as such. But unless one believes in the Pravda school of groupthink journalism, reporters should in fact be obligated from time to time to pursue stories that they suspect, despite their subject's less-than-mainstream profile, will ultimately be important investments for them and their publications to make.

It's always a balancing act. On one hand are the experts and the voices of mainstream and conventional wisdom. They're often where they are for very good reason. On the other hand, when a critical mass of skeptics raise at least some reasonable critiques of the experts, one needs also remember that these same experts are not infallible either. They rely on all the familiar foibles and tricks that people play when under fire. And in those cases, Upton Sinclair's sage words should be kept in mind, too:

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

Amen to that.

Will meets Queen! (Correction at 11)

If sunsets have seemed particularly red lately, this may be for good reason. Clouds of housedust, blown from countless old anthologies the world over, have recently been lofted into the atmosphere over the announcement of the latest (ahem) Shakespeare "discovery." It was certainly true in this office, where, upon learning of a new Shakespeare poem, I (quite literally) turned to a cobwebby stack of dusty books that I've long been meaning to sell—so I could look this "new" poem up.

The verse is a choppy old thing. It's an anonymous 18-line Elizabethan ditty that comes down to posterity as item 228 in an anthology of 400-year-old ditties and riddles and other miscellany, recorded by one Henry Stanford. It's titled "to ye Q. by ye players 1598." It's hardly lustrous—though it does have some spear-shaking overtones. Here: Read the old thing for yourself.

Point is that these 18 lines of anonymous verse, transcribed as part of their larger anthology in 1968, argued to (possibly) be by Shakespeare in 1972 and then published in book form in 1988, are just the latest dredgings that pass for bold new scholarship in the boneyard of conventional Shakespeare scholarship today.

Media reports of this "new" poem, however, have embellished the story almost beyond recognition.

Shakespeare, we are told, was "a resident playwright at Richmond Palace" at the time of this verse's royal recitation—which "may well have been spoken by Shakespeare himself." Plus Will was, says an editor of the new edition of the collected works that reprints the old thing, "probably in the habit of dashing some lines down on the back of an envelope and then chucking them away."

Yuh-huh. Did you know that there's just as much evidence that Shakespeare invented spaghetti? That he whistled while he worked? That he liked to wear red on Tuesdays?

Most intriguing observation about the old thing, though, must go to James Shapiro, who in his recent book 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare writes:

"Shakespeare imagines Elizabeth as a timeless and rejuvenating force, likening her to a clock hand perpetually circling, resistant to the ravages of time, outliving generations. There's a slight undertow to the conceit... the uncomfortable thought that Elizabeth will be around in a half century." [74-5]

Elizabeth was 65 years old at the time of this poem's known public reading. Wishing that this senior citizen stick around for another couple generations is more than just a "slight undertow." It's downright bizarre.

However, written to a much younger queen and then pulled out for old times' sake some two or three decades later is another story. One of the tenets of both "Shakespeare" By Another Name and the larger Oxfordian movement is that proto-"Shakespearean" works first written for a courtly audience in the 1560s, '70s and '80s were later revised or just re-performed for Elizabeth in the waning years of her reign.

It's an open question. Could this "new" poem, if indeed it is by the Bard, be like much of the rest of the Shakespeare canon: Bearing earmarks of a historical moment that was far too early to have been written by Will Shakspere of Stratford?

Signing Statement

Today is St. George's Day in England, celebrating the patron saint of the nation—the great dragon slayer. It's also traditionally celebrated as the birthday of Stratford-upon-Avon's famous son—although we actually don't have any records of Will Shakspere's birth, just his baptism.

Anyone who writes about Shakespeare also recognizes April 23 as that most sacred 24-hour period, The Feast of The Holy News Peg. It's the one day on the calendar that no editor, no matter how committed their soul may be to the alleged necessity of a "hook" or "peg," can refuse to consider Bard-related copy because it's not "news." Perhaps it's because we were never invited to enough cool parties as kids, but for those of us in the media biz, birthday celebrations are always good enough excuse for copy.

Some savvy Shakespeareans time their publication schedule around this day. (The editorial staff at Gotham was certainly pushing for an April 2005 release date for "Shakespeare" By Another Name—but lordy, lordy did those edits and re-edits and re-re-edits take a long time. It's a far better book for the extra four months we occupied, but the schedule change did mean All News Peg's Day of that year was spent sitting on our hands.)

To celebrate the Shakespearean All News Peg's Day of 2007, then, a coalition of the ... oh, I can't resist... Willing have released their Declaration of Reasonable Doubt About the Identity of William Shakespeare. (Forgive me father, for I have punned.)

It says, in so many words, that the Shakespeare authorship question is a legitimate issue deserving serious research and inquiry. If you agree with this statement, please consider signing it.

The 17 percent solution

Today's New York Times's Education section has a nice, brief article relating the results of a survey they conducted on how the Shakespeare authorship question is treated in colleges and universities around the U.S. The Times's William S. Niederkorn begins by quoting the top result from the poll: 82. That's the percent of Shakespeare professors who say there's no good reason to question the tautology at the core of Shakespeare studies: Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare.

Well, perhaps I'm just a half-glass-full sorta guy. (Waiter, more vino, per favore!) But this scribbler does take some solace in the fact that 17 percent of the 265 surveyed said that there was anywhere from possibly to definitely good reason to question the conventional belief that Will Shakspere of Stratford-upon-Avon was a poet or a playwright. As it happens, 17 is also the percentage of professors who had read "Shakespeare" By Another Name.

17 is a start. But, as all good scientific papers conclude: More work, clearly, needs to be done.