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A review by mhicks1988
Contested Will: Who Wrote Shakespeare? by James Shapiro
4.0
Spoilers: Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare.
What really makes Contested Will the fairest look at the so-called "authorship controversy" is that Shapiro so thoroughly examines the reasons that the anti-Stratfordians came to believe that William Shakespeare did not, in fact, write his own plays and poems. Shapiro very clearly knows what he's talking about, and he thoroughly documents the compelling reasons that all mainstream scholarship is 'Stratfordian.'
What really makes Contested Will interesting is that, rather than dismissing each of the Baconian and Oxfordian arguments point by point or ridiculing them, he looks into the cultural, literary, and personal forces that led so many people to dismiss the man from Stratford as the author of his plays. He writes thoughtfully and with sympathy, in a manner that many mainstream scholars simply haven't bothered. There's a lot to be learned, not just about the authorship controversy, but the history of Shakespeare studies in this book.
If I had one complaint, it would be that the book sags a bit in the middle from too heavy a focus on famous anti-Stratfordians, particularly Freud. Freud has an important place in his discussion, but it seemed to go a little long. Nevertheless, it's still a very worthy read.
What really makes Contested Will the fairest look at the so-called "authorship controversy" is that Shapiro so thoroughly examines the reasons that the anti-Stratfordians came to believe that William Shakespeare did not, in fact, write his own plays and poems. Shapiro very clearly knows what he's talking about, and he thoroughly documents the compelling reasons that all mainstream scholarship is 'Stratfordian.'
What really makes Contested Will interesting is that, rather than dismissing each of the Baconian and Oxfordian arguments point by point or ridiculing them, he looks into the cultural, literary, and personal forces that led so many people to dismiss the man from Stratford as the author of his plays. He writes thoughtfully and with sympathy, in a manner that many mainstream scholars simply haven't bothered. There's a lot to be learned, not just about the authorship controversy, but the history of Shakespeare studies in this book.
If I had one complaint, it would be that the book sags a bit in the middle from too heavy a focus on famous anti-Stratfordians, particularly Freud. Freud has an important place in his discussion, but it seemed to go a little long. Nevertheless, it's still a very worthy read.