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hanael14's review against another edition
4.0
Basically, rich, snobby people can't ~fathom~ how someone who wasn't also rich and snobby could have come up with these plays!
nwhyte's review against another edition
4.0
http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1692015.html
An excellent book about the Shakespeare authorship controversy. Shapiro is not really writing about the balance of evidence on either side, though he makes it clear that his sympathies are with the Stratford man rather than with Francis Bacon or the Earl of Oxford. His subject is more an attempt to work out why various highly regarded intellects (Mark Twain and Helen Keller for Bacon, Sigmund Freud for Oxford) should be attracted by such peculiar theories. His answer is that, for Twain and Freud in particular, it was emotionally important to see the plays and sonnets as autobiographical and revealing of their author's state of mind, even though this is completely anachronistic in terms of how Shakespeare and his contemporaries wrote and thought about writing.
The grand Oxford conspiracy theory (which in its wilder variations has the Earl as both son and lover of Queen Elizabeth, as well as being the author of the works of Shakespeare, Marlowe and many more) then happened to hit the Zeitgeist of the last few decades, when we have learned that governments often do lie to us about more important issues than who wrote a play, and questioning received wisdom has become habitual.
Finally, Shapiro points out that Shakespeare's claim to sole authorship of all the plays is no longer accepted by mainstream scholars, in that several of the plays are in fact collaborations (with Fletcher, Middleton, Wilkins and Peele; and he omits Kyd and Edward III). The idea that even a small part of Shakespeare might not be by Shakespeare was heretical until surprisingly recently. But real research, unlike Oxfordianism or Baconianism, moves on.
A good book to read as I crystallize my own biographical endeavours.
An excellent book about the Shakespeare authorship controversy. Shapiro is not really writing about the balance of evidence on either side, though he makes it clear that his sympathies are with the Stratford man rather than with Francis Bacon or the Earl of Oxford. His subject is more an attempt to work out why various highly regarded intellects (Mark Twain and Helen Keller for Bacon, Sigmund Freud for Oxford) should be attracted by such peculiar theories. His answer is that, for Twain and Freud in particular, it was emotionally important to see the plays and sonnets as autobiographical and revealing of their author's state of mind, even though this is completely anachronistic in terms of how Shakespeare and his contemporaries wrote and thought about writing.
The grand Oxford conspiracy theory (which in its wilder variations has the Earl as both son and lover of Queen Elizabeth, as well as being the author of the works of Shakespeare, Marlowe and many more) then happened to hit the Zeitgeist of the last few decades, when we have learned that governments often do lie to us about more important issues than who wrote a play, and questioning received wisdom has become habitual.
Finally, Shapiro points out that Shakespeare's claim to sole authorship of all the plays is no longer accepted by mainstream scholars, in that several of the plays are in fact collaborations (with Fletcher, Middleton, Wilkins and Peele; and he omits Kyd and Edward III). The idea that even a small part of Shakespeare might not be by Shakespeare was heretical until surprisingly recently. But real research, unlike Oxfordianism or Baconianism, moves on.
A good book to read as I crystallize my own biographical endeavours.
librarianonparade's review against another edition
4.0
This is a book about the Shakespeare authorship controversy - but it's more about the history of that controversy, and how and why people came to believe that someone other than Shakespeare wrote the plays, than it is a book weighing the merits of those various claims. Shapiro states right from the outset that he is a Stratfordian, that is, someone who believes William Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the plays and no-one else.
Whilst there are quite literally dozens of potential claimants this book focuses on the two main contenders, Francis Bacon and Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford. Without going into all the details, Shapiro's argument is that no-one really thought to question the authorship of the Shakespeare plays until the rise of autobiography in the eighteenth century. That was the point when critics and scholars started believing that all fiction, all poetry and novels and plays, necessarily drew on the author's own experiences, that you could understand an author's mind and life by reading between the lines of his work. And using that argument, how could Shakespeare, a rural glover's son with a grammar school education, possibly write about kings and queens, about shipwrecks and far away countries, about love and heartbreak and murder and betrayal? The facts of his life, the argument goes, don't fit. How could someone from Shakespeare's background display such knowledge of falconry, the Court, the law, geography, languages? Only someone from a more exalted background, someone who mixed with the very finest in the land, with all the resources and experiences money could buy, could possibly have known such things intimately enough to write about them. Someone like Francis Bacon or Edward de Vere, for example.
I, like Shapiro, don't buy it. It smacks of elitism, to me, this idea that because Shakespeare wasn't rich or noble, because he didn't travel or live in a fine house or hunt or joust, that he couldn't write about such things as if he knew them. To me it seems to reject the power of imagination, of genius. Authors don't have to have experienced something to write about it. That's what the imagination is for, to so powerfully evoke things unseen and unknown. That's why Shakespeare is such a genius. The arguments against Shakespeare seem so strained to me and so tenuous. Just because we don't have all the facts about Shakespeare that we would wish is not evidence that he wasn't who we believe him to be. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
And at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. As the man himself, whoever he may have been, once said, 'the play's the thing'. The plays are what is important, that we have them, that they've lasted, that they have as much impact today as they did 400 years ago. It would be wonderful to know about the man who wrote them, but we shouldn't let that obscure the really important thing, the legacy of his genius.
Whilst there are quite literally dozens of potential claimants this book focuses on the two main contenders, Francis Bacon and Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford. Without going into all the details, Shapiro's argument is that no-one really thought to question the authorship of the Shakespeare plays until the rise of autobiography in the eighteenth century. That was the point when critics and scholars started believing that all fiction, all poetry and novels and plays, necessarily drew on the author's own experiences, that you could understand an author's mind and life by reading between the lines of his work. And using that argument, how could Shakespeare, a rural glover's son with a grammar school education, possibly write about kings and queens, about shipwrecks and far away countries, about love and heartbreak and murder and betrayal? The facts of his life, the argument goes, don't fit. How could someone from Shakespeare's background display such knowledge of falconry, the Court, the law, geography, languages? Only someone from a more exalted background, someone who mixed with the very finest in the land, with all the resources and experiences money could buy, could possibly have known such things intimately enough to write about them. Someone like Francis Bacon or Edward de Vere, for example.
I, like Shapiro, don't buy it. It smacks of elitism, to me, this idea that because Shakespeare wasn't rich or noble, because he didn't travel or live in a fine house or hunt or joust, that he couldn't write about such things as if he knew them. To me it seems to reject the power of imagination, of genius. Authors don't have to have experienced something to write about it. That's what the imagination is for, to so powerfully evoke things unseen and unknown. That's why Shakespeare is such a genius. The arguments against Shakespeare seem so strained to me and so tenuous. Just because we don't have all the facts about Shakespeare that we would wish is not evidence that he wasn't who we believe him to be. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
And at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. As the man himself, whoever he may have been, once said, 'the play's the thing'. The plays are what is important, that we have them, that they've lasted, that they have as much impact today as they did 400 years ago. It would be wonderful to know about the man who wrote them, but we shouldn't let that obscure the really important thing, the legacy of his genius.
jonjeffryes's review against another edition
4.0
A book of criticism on some Shakespeare critics. It left me wondering who will critique the critics of the Shakespeare critics?
abeanbg's review against another edition
3.0
Bit disappointing after loving Shapiro's other books in Shakespeare. Think I wanted more about the Elizabethan period and less about the Victorians who dreamed up the authorship conspiracy.
crankylibrarian's review against another edition
4.0
The title is somewhat misleading: this is NOT another book questioning the authorship of Shakespeare's plays, but a history of the controversy. Shapiro, an English professor at Columbia University, thoughtfully examines the evolving notions of biblical skepticism, autobiographical fiction, psychobiography, and mistrust of expert authority which led such disparate figures as Sigmund Freud, Mark Twain, and Helen Keller to become Shakespearean skeptics. Shapiro notes that in every age, as readers try to find themselves in Shakespeare's writing, they inevitably attempt to re-construct Shakespeare the man according to the values and prejudices of their day.
Also see Scott McCrea's _The Case for Shakespeare: The End of the Authorship Question_ for a thorough trouncing of the anti-Stratford theories. http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/54982772
Also see Scott McCrea's _The Case for Shakespeare: The End of the Authorship Question_ for a thorough trouncing of the anti-Stratford theories. http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/54982772
ma1's review against another edition
5.0
Loved this book. It covers the history of Shakespeare deniers from beginning to end, and why they thought as they did, and ends with a rousing defense of the Bard. Very enjoyable.
claudiaswisher's review against another edition
5.0
FINISHED!! It's gonna take me forever to go back through this and make total sense...just saying, Shakespeare wrote the plays. He wrote them for money. He didn't write from personal experience (that's something the Romantics imposed on him), and shame on Derek Jacobi, one of my favorite Shakespearean actors, for thinking he didn't. Wasn't aware that Twain, Helen Keller, and Freud got involved in the controversy...as did Malcolm X. Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare!
sophronisba's review against another edition
4.0
A must-read if you are at all interested in the Shakespeare authorship question (particularly if you, like Shapiro--and like me--believe that Shakespeare wrote his own plays). Covers some of the same ground as Shakespeare's Lives, but in a more readable and engaging fashion. The final section is an extremely compelling (to me) argument for Shakespeare-as-author.