3 ms·

Shakespeare: Actor, Playwright, Social Climber

27 points by benbreen 10y ago

kapitza 10y ago
These documents sound legit, but methinks Alan Nelson doth protest too much. All Oxfordians (people who believe "Shakespeare" was a beard/pen name for Edward de Vere) agree that Shakespeare was an actor, ie, "player." It's also well-known that acting was a low-status occupation in Elizabethan society, explaining why people mocked Shakespeare's coat of arms. Writing, especially writing erudite verse in the Tudor court style, was not a low-status occupation in Elizabethan society. Anonymity/pseudonymity was not universal, but common. So an Oxfordian would ask: why is Shakespeare, as a social climber, awarded arms for a low-status profession that's considered basically artisanal in caste, leading to general mockery, when in fact he practices the high-status profession of courtly playwright/poet? Social climbers were not at all unheard of in the Elizabethan world. What is unheard of is a social climber who is not a social lion, whose resume is well-attested, whose presence and personality is constantly documented -- like, say, Ben Jonson. Doctors say: when you hear hoofbeats, think horses. Maybe Shakespeare wasn't a social climber at all, but remained a country bumpkin his whole life, as he moved from stagehand to actor to what we'd now call a producer? Maybe the plays and sonnets read like late Tudor court poetry because they are late Tudor court poetry? Maybe, like much Tudor court poetry, it was written pseudonymously, not for publication? The one coincidence that Oxfordians have to explain is how Vere wound up publishing under the name of this real individual, Shakespeare. Who (like Vere himself, of course) was involved in the theater world. Pseudonyms are typical in Tudor court poetry, but "beards" aren't. My guess, an idea I've never seen anyone else broach for obvious reasons, is that Will Shakespeare's first occupation when he came to London was... male prostitute. Again, when you hear hoofbeats, think horses. Maybe Vere just thought this week's boy had a pretty name. Here's some Tudor court poetry, by the way: http://shakespeareoxfordfellowship.org/what-is-desire-by-edward-de-vere/ http://shakespeareoxfordfellowship.org/what-is-desire-by-edw... Note the second stanza, which sounds exactly like Shakespeare to my ear. No one else from the period sounds like this. An Oxfordian would call this Shakespearean juvenilia.
- Chinjut 10y ago
  > when you hear hoofbeats, think horses Ok. I think the works authored under the name "Shakespeare" were indeed written by Shakespeare.
  - kapitza 10y ago
    So far as I know, the only historical document that even suggests a link between the playwright and the actor is the preface to the First Folio, by Ben Jonson and (purportedly) Hemings and Condell: http://www.shakespeare-online.com/biography/firstfolio.html http://www.shakespeare-online.com/biography/firstfolio.html Even in this text, the connection is pretty artful. And the Elizabethan era is not exactly well-known for frank, transparent confessions in print. The Folio is a rather slender evidentiary basis for supporting a large breeding population of zebras. You have to remember how status-conscious the Elizabethan era was. Imagine if a scathing academic novel becomes a bestseller, nominally fiction, but obviously a scathing roman-a-clef about the NYU English Department. But the name of the author, as shown on the book, is the name of an illiterate immigrant from Senegal, who happens to sell sunglasses on the pavement outside the NYU English Department. A zebra would be that the immigrant is actually a brilliant writer, who has overheard many conversations among the professors. A horse would be that the novel is written by one of the professors, who asked the immigrant his name and thought it sounded cool. Or maybe was the immigrant's lover. Or maybe it's just a coincidence. We are inclined to find the "zebra" version heartwarming and believable, because we believe in the American dream. Elizabethans did not believe in the American dream. They would have found the "country-bumpkin actor wrote courtly sonnets" theory preposterous, and paid very little attention to attestations on paper -- which were notoriously fraudulent. Today's professors have all kinds of problems in figuring out which Elizabethan actually wrote what.
- pessimist 10y ago
  > The one coincidence that Oxfordians have to explain is how Vere wound up publishing under the name of this real individual, Shakespeare. The other "coincidence" they need to explain is why all contemporary references to Shakespeare the playwright point to the Shakespeare from Stratford - from other members of Shakespeare's troupe like Ben Jonson, Heminges, Cowell. Nobody questioned his authorship till hundreds of years later.

27 points by benbreen 10y ago

These documents sound legit, but methinks Alan Nelson doth protest too much. All Oxfordians (people who believe "Shakespeare" was a beard/pen name for Edward de Vere) agree that Shakespeare was an actor, ie, "player." It's also well-known that acting was a low-status occupation in Elizabethan society, explaining why people mocked Shakespeare's coat of arms. Writing, especially writing erudite verse in the Tudor court style, was not a low-status occupation in Elizabethan society. Anonymity/pseudonymity was not universal, but common. So an Oxfordian would ask: why is Shakespeare, as a social climber, awarded arms for a low-status profession that's considered basically artisanal in caste, leading to general mockery, when in fact he practices the high-status profession of courtly playwright/poet? Social climbers were not at all unheard of in the Elizabethan world. What is unheard of is a social climber who is not a social lion, whose resume is well-attested, whose presence and personality is constantly documented -- like, say, Ben Jonson. Doctors say: when you hear hoofbeats, think horses. Maybe Shakespeare wasn't a social climber at all, but remained a country bumpkin his whole life, as he moved from stagehand to actor to what we'd now call a producer? Maybe the plays and sonnets read like late Tudor court poetry because they are late Tudor court poetry? Maybe, like much Tudor court poetry, it was written pseudonymously, not for publication? The one coincidence that Oxfordians have to explain is how Vere wound up publishing under the name of this real individual, Shakespeare. Who (like Vere himself, of course) was involved in the theater world. Pseudonyms are typical in Tudor court poetry, but "beards" aren't. My guess, an idea I've never seen anyone else broach for obvious reasons, is that Will Shakespeare's first occupation when he came to London was... male prostitute. Again, when you hear hoofbeats, think horses. Maybe Vere just thought this week's boy had a pretty name. Here's some Tudor court poetry, by the way: http://shakespeareoxfordfellowship.org/what-is-desire-by-edward-de-vere/ http://shakespeareoxfordfellowship.org/what-is-desire-by-edw... Note the second stanza, which sounds exactly like Shakespeare to my ear. No one else from the period sounds like this. An Oxfordian would call this Shakespearean juvenilia.

Chinjut 10y ago
> when you hear hoofbeats, think horses Ok. I think the works authored under the name "Shakespeare" were indeed written by Shakespeare.
- kapitza 10y ago
  So far as I know, the only historical document that even suggests a link between the playwright and the actor is the preface to the First Folio, by Ben Jonson and (purportedly) Hemings and Condell: http://www.shakespeare-online.com/biography/firstfolio.html http://www.shakespeare-online.com/biography/firstfolio.html Even in this text, the connection is pretty artful. And the Elizabethan era is not exactly well-known for frank, transparent confessions in print. The Folio is a rather slender evidentiary basis for supporting a large breeding population of zebras. You have to remember how status-conscious the Elizabethan era was. Imagine if a scathing academic novel becomes a bestseller, nominally fiction, but obviously a scathing roman-a-clef about the NYU English Department. But the name of the author, as shown on the book, is the name of an illiterate immigrant from Senegal, who happens to sell sunglasses on the pavement outside the NYU English Department. A zebra would be that the immigrant is actually a brilliant writer, who has overheard many conversations among the professors. A horse would be that the novel is written by one of the professors, who asked the immigrant his name and thought it sounded cool. Or maybe was the immigrant's lover. Or maybe it's just a coincidence. We are inclined to find the "zebra" version heartwarming and believable, because we believe in the American dream. Elizabethans did not believe in the American dream. They would have found the "country-bumpkin actor wrote courtly sonnets" theory preposterous, and paid very little attention to attestations on paper -- which were notoriously fraudulent. Today's professors have all kinds of problems in figuring out which Elizabethan actually wrote what.
pessimist 10y ago
> The one coincidence that Oxfordians have to explain is how Vere wound up publishing under the name of this real individual, Shakespeare. The other "coincidence" they need to explain is why all contemporary references to Shakespeare the playwright point to the Shakespeare from Stratford - from other members of Shakespeare's troupe like Ben Jonson, Heminges, Cowell. Nobody questioned his authorship till hundreds of years later.