HELP WANTED: Phenomenal Genius With Puritan Work Ethic To Write Shakespeare Works
Elizabeth Weir
In his biography of the Renaissance genius Francis Bacon,
the famous English writer and barrister from Middle Temple,
William Hepworth Dixon, answers the test question that
Stratfordians, Oxfordians, Marlites and Derbyites persistently
flunk:
Did Francis Bacon have the time to write the
write the Shakespeare works?
Hepworth Dixon writes:
If no one at the court could match [Bacon's] tongue of fire,
so no one in the House of Commons could breast him in the race
of work. He put the dunce to flight, the drudge to shame.
If [Bacon] soared high above rivals in his more passionate
play of speech, he never met a rival in the dull, dry task of
ordinary toil.
Raleigh, Hyde, and Cecil had small chance against him in debate;
in committee Yelverton and Coke had none.
Bob Grumman
So The Infinitely Glorious Renaissance Super-Genius Francis Bacon had time to
wrtie the Works of Shakespeare, so what? Who didn't? Besides Will Shakespeare
of Stratford-upon-Avon, that is.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
And your evidence that the Burgher was a genius is what?
Taken from the Shakespeare works? There's nothing outside
the works to suggest that the Burgher was a genius and
the non-literary evidence listed on the Kathman-Ross site
attests to the fact that he was quite ordinary.
History's greatest genius doesn't have to make a living
collecting tithes from parishioners in the form of bags
of corn and wool.
That's how the Burgher spent his time, Grumman.
The farmers around Stratford didn't have coinage so the
Burgher went out with a wagon and collected bags of
commodities and sold them on behalf of Trinity parish.
He turned 80% of the money over to Trinity and he
kept 20%. That's how "history's greatest genius"
made his living.
Do you seriously believe that the genius who wrote
the Shakespeare works was out in a waggon picking
up hides and livestock and selling it to pay the
parish? Grow up, Grumman.
Roundtable
> >
> > So The Infinitely Glorious Renaissance Super-Genius Francis Bacon had time to
> > wrtie the Works of Shakespeare, so what? Who didn't? Besides Will Shakespeare
> > of Stratford-upon-Avon, that is.
> >
> > --Bob G.
>
> And your evidence that the Burgher was a genius is what?
> Taken from the Shakespeare works? There's nothing outside
> the works to suggest that the Burgher was a genius and
> the non-literary evidence listed on the Kathman-Ross site
> attests to the fact that he was quite ordinary.
>
> History's greatest genius doesn't have to make a living
> collecting tithes from parishioners in the form of bags
> of corn and wool.
>
> That's how the Burgher spent his time, Grumman.
>
> The farmers around Stratford didn't have coinage so the
> Burgher went out with a wagon and collected bags of
> commodities and sold them on behalf of Trinity parish.
> He turned 80% of the money over to Trinity and he
> kept 20%. That's how "history's greatest genius"
> made his living.
>
> Do you seriously believe that the genius who wrote
> the Shakespeare works was out in a waggon picking
> up hides and livestock and selling it to pay the
> parish? Grow up, Grumman.
I was under the impression that Will of Stratford spent a
good deal of his time on and around the London stage.
"Historys greatest geniuses" made their livings doing lots
of things that frequently didn't have much to do with their
genius travail.
We think Will was a genius, and his fellow actors - and
playwrights like Ben Jonson - thought he was bloody brilliant,
but most other people just thought he was a damn good
playwright.
We also think Van Gogh is a genius, for example, but his fellow
men, with the exception of his brother and a few other painters,
thought he was a nutcase, for example, and only bought two of his
paintings during his lifetime.
Roundtable
Bob Grumman
>> >the famous English writer and barrister from Middle Temple,
>> >William Hepworth Dixon, answers the test question that
>> >Stratfordians, Oxfordians, Marlites and Derbyites persistently
>> >flunk:
>> >
>> > Did Francis Bacon have the time to write the
>> > write the Shakespeare works?
>> >
>> >Hepworth Dixon writes:
>> >
>> > If no one at the court could match [Bacon's] tongue of fire,
>> > so no one in the House of Commons could breast him in the race
>> > of work. He put the dunce to flight, the drudge to shame.
>> >
>> > If [Bacon] soared high above rivals in his more passionate
>> > play of speech, he never met a rival in the dull, dry task of
>> > ordinary toil.
>> >
>> > Raleigh, Hyde, and Cecil had small chance against him in debate;
>> > in committee Yelverton and Coke had none.
>>
>> So The Infinitely Glorious Renaissance Super-Genius Francis Bacon had time to
>> of Stratford-upon-Avon, that is.
>>
>> --Bob G.
>
>And your evidence that the Burgher was a genius is what?
Try to pay attention, Elizabeth. I said nothing about any Burgher's genius
above. As for Shakespeare's genius, my evidence is the monument that gives him
the genius of Socrates. His name on various well-received plays supports this
record. It must be admitted that the record was carved six or seven years after
the Burgher died, when no one could be expected to remember anything of
consequence about him, so is weak evidence.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
> >> >In his biography of the Renaissance genius Francis Bacon,
> >> >the famous English writer and barrister from Middle Temple,
> >> >William Hepworth Dixon, answers the test question that
> >> >Stratfordians, Oxfordians, Marlites and Derbyites persistently
> >> >flunk:
> >> >
> >> > Did Francis Bacon have the time to write the
> >> > write the Shakespeare works?
> >> >
> >> >Hepworth Dixon writes:
> >> >
> >> > If no one at the court could match [Bacon's] tongue of fire,
> >> > so no one in the House of Commons could breast him in the race
> >> > of work. He put the dunce to flight, the drudge to shame.
> >> >
> >> > If [Bacon] soared high above rivals in his more passionate
> >> > play of speech, he never met a rival in the dull, dry task of
> >> > ordinary toil.
> >> >
> >> > Raleigh, Hyde, and Cecil had small chance against him in debate;
> >> > in committee Yelverton and Coke had none.
> >>
> >> So The Infinitely Glorious Renaissance Super-Genius Francis Bacon had time to
> >>write the Works of Shakespeare, so what? Who didn't? Besides Will Shakespeare
> >> of Stratford-upon-Avon, that is.
> >>
> >> --Bob G.
> >
> >And your evidence that the Burgher was a genius is what?
>
> Try to pay attention, Elizabeth.
I'm paying close attention, Bob, and I detect that your claim
that I'm not paying attention is your attempt to wiggle out
of the question.
> I said nothing about any Burgher's genius
> above.
That's because you can't come up with anything and I note
you're reduced to hedging grammar.
> As for Shakespeare's genius, my evidence is the monument that gives him
> the genius of Socrates.
My evidence is that Jonson was a monumental parodist.
I've already cited Annabel Patterson, Sterling Professor of
Literature, Yale, who wrote a study on Jonson's "double speak."
Jonson is mocking the Burgher. Jonson knew the identity of the
author of the Shakespeare plays as early as 1598.
> His name on various well-received plays supports this
> record.
Every mask in literary history has his or her name on the title
page of something.
In an authorship dispute a name on a title page is just the
starting point in the search for evidence.
Now if the Stratford Shakespeare had a handwriting match with
the Henry IV draft you'd have something but sadly it wasn't
written an illiterate barbaric scrawl.
> It must be admitted that the record was carved six or seven years after
> the Burgher died, when no one could be expected to remember anything of
> consequence about him, so is weak evidence.
Let's see. . . I'm checking. . . ohhh, I'm sorry, Bob.
That's not an officially registered Strat Excuse. You'll have
to come up with another one.
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Weir
lancelo...@hotmail.com (Roundtable) wrote in message news:<fd6ab3a4.03050...@posting.google.com>...
As an actor and investor.
The evidence that the Stratford Shakespeare was an
actor is more secure than the evidence that the
same Shakespeare wrote the plays.
> "Historys greatest geniuses" made their livings doing lots
> of things that frequently didn't have much to do with their
> genius travail.
Then Bacon is an exception because his vocations and
avocations are all over the plays.
> We think Will was a genius, and his fellow actors - and
> playwrights like Ben Jonson - thought he was bloody brilliant,
> but most other people just thought he was a damn good
> playwright.
Jonson was a brilliant parodist and he did his best work
in the First Folio. A distinguished scholar, Annabel Patterson,
has written a book on Jonson's mastery of "double speak."
Jonson's so-called eulogy is a mock encomium in the
Senecan style in which the one praised, the butt of the joke,
is lauded in the attributes of a more famous man or men.
The cognoscenti then read it on two levels.
> We also think Van Gogh is a genius, for example, but his fellow
> men, with the exception of his brother and a few other painters,
> thought he was a nutcase, for example, and only bought two of his
> paintings during his lifetime.
The word "genius" has been so debased that if you type
"francis bacon" + "genius" in a search engine you get
20,000 hits for the Irish painter who had about the same
level of genius as Lucien Freud.
That Francis Bacon was a collateral descendant of the genius
Francis Bacon, incidently.
Elizabeth
Bob Grumman
tactic of mine: I am herewith distinguishing not between direct and indirect, or
hard and soft evidence, and the like, but between factual evidence and factoidal
evidence. Factual evidence for Shakespeare: the testimony of his monument;
factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
I hope to write a short essay concerning the above theme, but will not argue
about it right now.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
> I'm not bothering to answer Elizabeth's confused blather
And I apologize for not being able to respond to all your
confused blather, Grumman.
There just isn't the time or inclination.
> but announcing a new
> tactic of mine: I am herewith distinguishing not between direct and indirect, or
> hard and soft evidence,
You must have stopped distinguishing between categories of evidence
just before I arrived in HLAS.
> and the like, but between factual evidence and factoidal
> evidence.
There is no such thing as "hard and soft evidence," Grumman.
Those are colloquialisms.
> Factual evidence for Shakespeare:
The P R O B L E M for Strats, Grumman, is that while they have
evidence of the first order of the Burgher's burghership in
Stratford, they have only ambiguous literary evidence of the
Burgher's authorship of the Shakespeare works. Nothing first
hand. No reliable witnesses. No evidence such as a holograph
that can exclude inferences.
> the testimony of his monument;
A few objections to that theory: An anonymous epitaph cannot
be considered to be evidence. It could be considered part of
a circumstantial case but it has to be backed up by corroborative
evidence. Names on title pages would be very weak corrobrative
evidence for the monument. You would need something like a scrap
of paper that had a draft version of the epitaph or something
about it in a letter from a contemporary who had direct knowledge
of the Burgher's authorship.
> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
In the authorship distpute Strats have to assume a
burden of proof and show evidence that the Burgher
had sufficient education not to be a mere playwright
but that he received an extraordinary education to
prepare him to write the most intellectual of all
literary works.
Of the four leading authorship candidates, only Francis Bacon
received an extraordinary education, an education almost
unique in history.
Bob Grumman
>> the testimony of his monument;
>
>A few objections to that theory: An anonymous epitaph cannot
>be considered to be evidence.
It is a FACT that someone said Shakespeare of Stratford was a writer sometime
between 1616 and 1623. That cannot be denied. It is therefore evidence that he
was a writer. You can claim that it is weak evidence, though it of course is
not.
>> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
>> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
>In the authorship dispute Strats have to assume a
>burden of proof and show evidence that the Burgher
>had sufficient education not to be a mere playwright
>but that he received an extraordinary education to
>prepare him to write the most intellectual of all
>literary works.
You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
"received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
--Bob G.
John W. Kennedy
> You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
> "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
> intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
You don't understand anti-Strat logic:
Effective use of language is easy.
Precise observation and drawing of character is easy.
Pacing is easy.
Shakespeare is a great author
But it couldn't have anything to do with language, or
character drawing, or pacing, because all of those
are easy (and even a little disreputable).
So his greatness must lie elsewhere.
It must be his educational value.
In a way, it's rather amusing that Weird Lizzie, who so readily goes
into orgasms over the Renaissance, should actually have such a
fundamentally medieval attitude. She seems to have Shakespeare confused
with Jean de Meung.
--
John W. Kennedy
"Never try to take over the international economy based on a radical
feminist agenda if you're not sure your leader isn't a transvestite."
-- "She-Spies"
Greg Reynolds
Bob, you're working too hard! Just kick out any
theory obviously nurtured solely by its own conclusion.
Antis need to deconstruct the knowledge base. SO they
become oh-so-obvious in the selective treatment of the
historical record. I will use the best and the brightest, Diana
Price, as an example here...
That Diana Price's cold teachings do not point to any writer
does not distract us from the fact that Diana has her own mind
set on where her detail will lead, and hence she can feature only
details that support THAT conclusion.
SO, Susanna Hall is illiterate in Diana's teachings but only
because Diana thinks it helps lead us to her conclusion. Diana is
obviously working backward toward her conclusion because
Susanna's level of literacy is not known.
No one knows how much Susanna could read or write,
but Diana Price actually declares Susanna functionally illiterate!
Why does Diana Price base her unnecessary CONCLUSION
on just one random piece of evidence? Why does Diana Price
portend that this was the one and only time that Susanna
attempted any penmanship?
Very obviously, Diana is working from her own conclusion.
Diana thinks she is LEADING us to her conclusion, but we see
that it is where she STARTED. Diana has no basis to judge
Susanna's literacy. One sample does not amount to much
so it is Diana who is lacking, not Susanna. We know Susanna
owned books which happens to be A CRITERION DIANA
PRICE SETS AS THE INDICATION OF BEING A WRITER!
Wow, her self contradictory monstrosity of a hatchet job is
so convoluted it's no wonder Diana and Pat don't respond.
SO--Diana Price's reading deficiency is known, whereas
Susanna's is not. If Dooley believes Price gave Susanna
a fair hearing on this one, he is a mercenary hangdog.
Greg Reynolds
Elizabeth Weir
> >> the testimony of his monument;
> >
> >A few objections to that theory: An anonymous epitaph cannot
> >be considered to be evidence.
>
> It is a FACT that someone said Shakespeare of Stratford was a writer sometime
> between 1616 and 1623. That cannot be denied. It is therefore evidence that he
> was a writer. You can claim that it is weak evidence, though it of course is
> not.
No one denies that "someone" said that the Burgher was a
writer. All witnesses have to be tested, Grumman. Jonson
can't pass the test.
> >> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
> >> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
>
> >In the authorship dispute Strats have to assume a
> >burden of proof and show evidence that the Burgher
> >had sufficient education not to be a mere playwright
> >but that he received an extraordinary education to
> >prepare him to write the most intellectual of all
> >literary works.
>
> You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
> "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
> intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
What is more unbelievable, Grumman?
1. That a country lad spontaneously wrote the
most intellectual of all literary works or
2. The author of the most intellectual of
all literary works received an extraordinary
education?
Bob Grumman
>
>Bob Grumman wrote:
>
>> I'm not bothering to answer Elizabeth's confused blather but announcing a new
>>tactic of mine: I am herewith distinguishing not between direct and indirect, or
>>hard and soft evidence, and the like, but between factual evidence and factoidal
>> evidence. Factual evidence for Shakespeare: the testimony of his monument;
>> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
>> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
>>
>> I hope to write a short essay concerning the above theme, but will not argue
>> about it right now.
>>
>> --Bob G.
>
>Bob, you're working too hard! Just kick out any
>theory obviously nurtured solely by its own conclusion.
That's what I'm trying to do, in a slightly new way, inspired by the slightly
new way my heroine, Diana Price, presents standard Ogburnianism (i.e., why dint
nobody say nothing about Will Shakespeare of STRATFORD being a writer?)
Nice writing from you, though, on Ms. Price's entry in the clash of opinion.
I note that in this case, as in so many specimens of Shakespeare-rejecter's
argumentation, a double opinion is used: (1) Susanna was illiterate; (2) the
daughters of great writers are not illiterate.
--Bob G.
Bob Grumman
elizabe...@mail.com says...
>
>Bob Grumman <Bob_m...@newsguy.com> wrote in message
>news:<b9ej3...@drn.newsguy.com>...
>> >> the testimony of his monument;
>> >
>> >A few objections to that theory: An anonymous epitaph cannot
>> >be considered to be evidence.
>>
>> It is a FACT that someone said Shakespeare of Stratford was a writer sometime
>>between 1616 and 1623. That cannot be denied. It is therefore evidence that he
>> was a writer. You can claim that it is weak evidence, though it of course is
>> not.
>
>No one denies that "someone" said that the Burgher was a
>writer. All witnesses have to be tested, Grumman. Jonson
>can't pass the test.
My point is ONLY that the testimony of the monument is a fact. Unlike your
opinion that Jonson wrote, and your opinion, with no factual evidence, that he
was lying when he did so.
>>>> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
>> >> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
>>
>> >In the authorship dispute Strats have to assume a
>> >burden of proof and show evidence that the Burgher
>> >had sufficient education not to be a mere playwright
>> >but that he received an extraordinary education to
>> >prepare him to write the most intellectual of all
>> >literary works.
>>
>> You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
>> "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
>> intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
>
>What is more unbelievable, Grumman?
>
>1. That a country lad spontaneously wrote the
>most intellectual of all literary works or
>2. The author of the most intellectual of
>all literary works received an extraordinary
>education?
Well, one write who wrote literary works that were much more intellectual than
Shakespeare's was Tom Stoppard. He had only a high school education at the
time. Another who wrote literary works more intellectual than Shakespeare's was
Wallace Stevens. He went to Harvard but can't be said to have had all that
"extraordinary" an education.
But in answer to your question: (2) is more likely than (1); going from my
knowledge of writers, however, if (1) were stated honestly, without
"spontaneously," I would say it was a toss up.
Note that you ignored what I said was unbelievable: which is that you seem to be
claiming as a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
>> "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
>>intellectual of all literary works?" It is not. It is what sane people would
>>call an opinion. even those stupid or ignorant enough to agree with it--those,
>>like you--who know nothing about either Shakespeare or how the creative mind
>>works.
--Bob G.
Greg Reynolds
> In article <3EBB2A3A...@core.com>, Greg says...
> >
> >Bob Grumman wrote:
> >
> >> I'm not bothering to answer Elizabeth's confused blather but announcing a new
> >>tactic of mine: I am herewith distinguishing not between direct and indirect, or
> >>hard and soft evidence, and the like, but between factual evidence and factoidal
> >> evidence. Factual evidence for Shakespeare: the testimony of his monument;
> >> factoidal evidence against Shakespeare: the opinion that he lacked sufficient
> >> education of the proper kind to have been a playwright.
> >>
> >> I hope to write a short essay concerning the above theme, but will not argue
> >> about it right now.
> >>
> >> --Bob G.
> >
> >Bob, you're working too hard! Just kick out any
> >theory obviously nurtured solely by its own conclusion.
>
> That's what I'm trying to do, in a slightly new way, inspired by the slightly
> new way my heroine, Diana Price, presents standard Ogburnianism (i.e., why dint
> nobody say nothing about Will Shakespeare of STRATFORD being a writer?)
>
> Nice writing from you, though, on Ms. Price's entry in the clash of opinion.
> I note that in this case, as in so many specimens of Shakespeare-rejecter's
> argumentation, a double opinion is used: (1) Susanna was illiterate; (2) the
> daughters of great writers are not illiterate.
>
> --Bob G.
What is hilarious about Price's arbitrary test
is that Susanna Shakespeare scores higher than Marlowe!
2. Record of correspondence concerning literary matters
See Cooke if books are literary matters
6. Handwritten inscriptions, receipts, letters, etc. touching on literary
matters
See Cooke if books are literary matters
7. Commendatory verses, epistles, or epigrams contributed or received
Witty, some of Shakespeare in that
9. Evidence of books owned, borrowed, or given.
See Cooke
10. Notice at death as a writer
Witty, some of Shakespeare in that
SO, if Shakespeare wrote too little, Price has written TOO MUCH!
She's contradicting herself and confusing everyone except Dooley.
Greg Reynolds
Elizabeth Weir
> Bob Grumman wrote:
> > You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
> > "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
> > intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
>
> You don't understand anti-Strat logic:
>
> Effective use of language is easy.
> Precise observation and drawing of character is easy.
> Pacing is easy.
Intellectual vacuity delivered with egoistic pomposity.
> Shakespeare is a great author
> But it couldn't have anything to do with language, or
> character drawing, or pacing, because all of those
> are easy (and even a little disreputable).
> So his greatness must lie elsewhere.
> It must be his educational value.
>
> In a way, it's rather amusing that Weird Lizzie, who so readily goes
> into orgasms over the Renaissance. . .
You've make Grumman look civil. I didn't think it was possible.
> should actually have such a
> fundamentally medieval attitude.
Stratfordianism is a reversion to the 14th century lead by
Renaissance-hating Strat biographers.
> She seems to have Shakespeare confused
> with Jean de Meung.
Not all. Shakespeare was a feudal burgher and de Meung
was a medieval poet. Stratfordians have their feudal burgher
confused with the Renaissance genius who refuted the
sentimental romances of Catholic medievalism by writing
the empirical Shakespare plays.
Elizabeth Weir
> In article <3EBB2A3A...@core.com>, Greg says...
> >
> >Bob Grumman wrote:
> >
> >> I'm not bothering to answer Elizabeth's confused blather but announcing a new
> >>tactic of mine:
No chopping the last word off my headings to avoid
answering my posts, Grumman. It isn't sportsmanlike.
Elizabeth Weir
[snip of Grumman's self-pitying blather]
>
> What is hilarious about Price's arbitrary test
> is that Susanna Shakespeare scores higher than Marlowe!
>
> 2. Record of correspondence concerning literary matters
> See Cooke if books are literary matters
>
> 6. Handwritten inscriptions, receipts, letters, etc. touching on literary
> matters
> See Cooke if books are literary matters
>
> 7. Commendatory verses, epistles, or epigrams contributed or received
> Witty, some of Shakespeare in that
>
> 9. Evidence of books owned, borrowed, or given.
> See Cooke
>
> 10. Notice at death as a writer
> Witty, some of Shakespeare in that
>
> SO, if Shakespeare wrote too little, Price has written TOO MUCH!
> She's contradicting herself and confusing everyone except Dooley.
I can't follow some of your evidence but I can see at a glance
that Susanna scored higher than Shakespeare.
I'll give you 7. if your including epitaphs but you can't
have 10. because the OED shows "witty" as having a religious
connotation:
B. witty
1. Having wisdom.
a. Said of God or Christ: cf. WISE a. 1 (b). Obs.
Beowulf 685 Witi god..hali dryhten. a1000 Cædmon's Exod.
25 Hu as woruld worhte witi drihten. . . . 1380 Lay Folks'
Catech. (L.) 531 This god is most myty yng at may be.
The most wytty and most rytful. c1400 LOVE Bonavent. Mirr.
i. (1908) 18 The persone of the sone [is] al wyse and witty.
c1480 HENRYSON Swallow vi, God in all his werkis wittie is.
Honigmann missed a crucial allusion in Hall's epitaph
that would have identified Susanna Hall as a Presbyterian.
Honigmann considers Hall's ephitaph to be secular but
the pius Presbyterian Puritans would never have a
secular tombstone.
The phrase "something of Shakespeare in all of that"
is a bit of historical revisionism to make the Burgher
look religious after the fact. The line translates to
"Shakespeare had a hand in training his daughter to
be witty [have wisdom] in religion" not "Shakespare had
a hand in giving his daughter an education."
Bob Grumman
>> >
>>>> I'm not bothering to answer Elizabeth's confused blather but announcing a new
>> >>tactic of mine:
>
>No chopping the last word off my headings to avoid
>answering my posts, Grumman. It isn't sportsmanlike.
I don't know what you're talking about, wack.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
The heading on this post is attentuated:
Re: HELP WANTED: Phenomenal Genius With Puritan Work Ethic To Write
Write what?
Please don'r reply, I'm bored with it.
Bob Grumman
>> >answering my posts, Grumman. It isn't sportsmanlike.
>>
>> I don't know what you're talking about, wack.
>
>The heading on this post is attentuated:
>
>Re: HELP WANTED: Phenomenal Genius With Puritan Work Ethic To Write
>
>Write what?
>
>Please don'r reply, I'm bored with it.
Sorry, but I will reply. The above is an interesting example of your psychosis.
How many converts do you think you lost because the header was shortened? How
could you think a dolt like me would have been clever enough to think of
shortening it? I didn't, by the way, nor did I notice it had been shortened.
It's one of those Internet glitches that happen all the time.
--Bob G.
Paul Crowley
news:wLCua.25713$AG6.5...@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net...
> Bob Grumman wrote:
> > You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
> > "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
> > intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
>
> You don't understand anti-Strat logic:
>
> Effective use of language is easy.
> Precise observation and drawing of character is easy.
> Pacing is easy.
>
> Shakespeare is a great author
> But it couldn't have anything to do with language, or
> character drawing, or pacing, because all of those
> are easy (and even a little disreputable).
> So his greatness must lie elsewhere.
> It must be his educational value.
You forgot to articulate the Strat logic . . It wasn't
education; it wasn't his genes, his background
of illiteracy, his social connections, his 'mentor',
nor anything else. . . . so It could only have been
HIS MAGIC PEN !
And since that is a 100% satisfactory answer, it
leaves no problems nor questions. It is not merely
irrelevant to look any further, it is impertinent.
(But why have there been no other magic pens?
Oops, sorry, I forgot that it is heresy to ask a
question.)
Paul.
Elizabeth Weir
> >> >No chopping the last word off my headings to avoid
> >> >answering my posts, Grumman. It isn't sportsmanlike.
> >>
> >> I don't know what you're talking about, wack.
> >
> >The heading on this post is attentuated:
> >
> >Re: HELP WANTED: Phenomenal Genius With Puritan Work Ethic To Write
> >
> >Write what?
> >
> >Please don'r reply, I'm bored with it.
>
> Sorry, but I will reply. The above is an interesting example of your psychosis.
I see Webb has made you a convert. Sitting at the feet of the
master [of abuse] are we?
> How many converts do you think you lost because the header was shortened?
How many converts do you think the Baconians would have made if they
were messianic ideologues like Strats? There are nearly no Baconians
because they rely on science and civility, not seduction and abuse
[seduction alternating with abuse is the basis of the conversion
system].
> How
> could you think a dolt like me would have been clever enough to think of
> shortening it?
I said I was bored with this Grumman. You probably just fell
face down on you keyboard and hit the delete button with your nose.
> I didn't, by the way, nor did I notice it had been shortened.
> It's one of those Internet glitches that happen all the time.
>
Thank you for the explanation. I appreciate it.
Lorenzo4344
>Shakespeare Works
>From: Bob Grumman Bob_m...@newsguy.com
>Date: 5/9/2003
>you seem to be claiming as a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean
oevre...
If this is to be your word of the month, try "oeUvre," Bob. Everytime. Quite
welcome.
Lorenzo
"Mark the music."
Bob Grumman
If you want constantly to lie about our position, Paul, why not be creative and
say we think aliens for the 23rd dimension told him what to write?
Just for the record, I believe he became the writer he did because of his genes,
and his learning somehow to read, and because he became an actor at the time he
did. I doubt that you will credit me with this view--I've stated it ten or
twenty times, but you consistently ignore what I say. I doubt that other
Stratfordians believe he became what he did for exactly the same reasons as
mine, but none believe in any sort of magic pen, only that he no more needed a
university education than Hardy, Yeats, Keats, Jonson, Stoppard, Mencken, Twain,
Thomas, Shaw and many other writers of the first rank in English did.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
> "John W. Kennedy" <jwk...@attglobal.net> wrote in message
> news:wLCua.25713$AG6.5...@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net...
>
> > Bob Grumman wrote:
>
> > > You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
> > > "received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
> > > intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
> >
> > You don't understand anti-Strat logic:
> >
> > Effective use of language is easy.
> > Precise observation and drawing of character is easy.
> > Pacing is easy.
> >
> > Shakespeare is a great author
> > But it couldn't have anything to do with language, or
> > character drawing, or pacing, because all of those
> > are easy (and even a little disreputable).
> > So his greatness must lie elsewhere.
> > It must be his educational value.
>
> You forgot to articulate the Strat logic . . It wasn't
> education; it wasn't his genes, his background
> of illiteracy, his social connections, his 'mentor',
> nor anything else. . . . so It could only have been
>
> HIS MAGIC PEN !
Haha!
Bob Grumman
elizabe...@mail.com says...
>
>Bob Grumman <Bob_m...@newsguy.com> wrote in message
>news:<b9l81...@drn.newsguy.com>...
>> >> >No chopping the last word off my headings to avoid
>> >> >answering my posts, Grumman. It isn't sportsmanlike.
>> >>
>> >> I don't know what you're talking about, wack.
>> >
>> >The heading on this post is attentuated:
>> >
>> >Re: HELP WANTED: Phenomenal Genius With Puritan Work Ethic To Write
>> >
>> >Write what?
>> >
>> >Please don'r reply, I'm bored with it.
>>
>>Sorry, but I will reply. The above is an interesting example of your psychosis.
>I see Webb has made you a convert. Sitting at the feet of the
>master [of abuse] are we?
I don't believe I've ever implied that I didn't think you were nuts.
>> How many converts do you think you lost because the header was shortened?
>
>How many converts do you think the Baconians would have made if they
>were messianic ideologues like Strats? There are nearly no Baconians
>because they rely on science and civility, not seduction and abuse
>[seduction alternating with abuse is the basis of the conversion
>system].
No, we rely on facts, you on opinions and abuse of Shakespeare and sanity, which
sparks answering abuse.
>> How
>> could you think a dolt like me would have been clever enough to think of
>> shortening it?
>
>I said I was bored with this Grumman. You probably just fell
>face down on you keyboard and hit the delete button with your nose.
>
>> I didn't, by the way, nor did I notice it had been shortened.
>> It's one of those Internet glitches that happen all the time.
>>
>Thank you for the explanation. I appreciate it.
Well, it did give me a chance to insult you some more.
--Bob G.
John W. Kennedy
> "John W. Kennedy" <jwk...@attglobal.net> wrote in message news:<wLCua.25713$AG6.5...@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>...
>
>>Bob Grumman wrote:
>>
>>>You really think it is a FACT that the author of the Shakespearean oevre
>>>"received an extraordinary education to prepare him to write the most
>>>intellectual of all literary works?" Unbelievable.
>>
>>You don't understand anti-Strat logic:
>>
>> Effective use of language is easy.
>> Precise observation and drawing of character is easy.
>> Pacing is easy.
>
>
> Intellectual vacuity delivered with egoistic pomposity.
I quite agree, but it's _your_position, not mine.
> Stratfordianism is a reversion to the 14th century lead by
> Renaissance-hating Strat biographers.
Hilarious (even apart from the misspelling)! Here's a clue, Lizzie:
the Meistersänger superseded the Minnesänger, not the other way around.
>>She seems to have Shakespeare confused
>>with Jean de Meung.
> Not all. Shakespeare was a feudal burgher and de Meung
> was a medieval poet.
Do you attach any actual meaning to the word "feudal" at all, or is it
merely a phatic dyslogism to you?
> Stratfordians have their feudal burgher
> confused with the Renaissance genius who refuted the
> sentimental romances of Catholic medievalism by writing
> the empirical Shakespare plays.
...especially those final triumphs of empiricism, "Pericles",
"Cymbeline", "The Winter's Tale", and "The Tempest".
Oh, by the way, precisely how does one go about "refuting" a "romance"?
Does _any_ word more difficult than "cat", "dinner", or "red" mean
anything to you at all?
John W. Kennedy
> You forgot to articulate the Strat logic . . It wasn't
> education; it wasn't his genes, his background
> of illiteracy, his social connections, his 'mentor',
> nor anything else. . . . so It could only have been
That's a lie.
It is true that it certainly wasn't education beyond what the works
actually exhibit, which is a standard Elizabethan grammar-school
education. Genes, as any educated person knows, are nearly meaningless
as a predictor of literary talent. He did not have a background of
illiteracy. He did, in fact, have _some_ social connections through his
profession, but the supposition that social connections are necessary to
the literary life is nothing but plain old snobbery (no doubt you
pronounce your name "cro-LAY"), and can empirically refuted a thousand
times over. We have no record of whether he had or did not have a
"mentor", though he almost certainly did, theatre being what it is.
David Tame
"Elizabeth Weir" <elizabe...@mail.com> wrote in message
news:efbc3534.03050...@posting.google.com...
The author of the plays displays a profound knowledge of:
1. Law. (The one Elizabeth champions practiced law; Shaksper - of course
not.) This is not merely a passing knowledge but precise knowledge.
2. Politics. (Elizabeth's candidate was part of the Royal Court and also in
Parliament. Shaksper - neither of course.)
3. Academic learning. Shaksper went to no university, most of the other
candidates did.
4. The author knows Latin, Greek, Spanish, French, Italian. This is partly
evidenced from his quoting and referring to works not then translated into
English, and only available at the Courts of Europe. All impossible for
Shaksper. Not for Bacon. Possibly not for other candidates.
5. Philosophy.
6. Intimate knowledge of European geography, including distances from place
to place, as one having travelled there. How far did Shaksper travel?
7. Actually, the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine (I
admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at the time:
not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
Of course, over half the folio plays had only been published or played
anonymously before 1623. Someone around 1623 "decided" to put them under the
name of Shake-Speare (with that curious hyphonation not otherwise used then
or now for such a name - after all Shaksper's name has no hyphon). Why,
then, the hyphon?
The Shaker of the Speare was Pallas Athena, also apearing on frontiespieces
of various Shake-Speare MSs. And Pallas Athena was the Muse Bacon has
referred to.
The author loved a good joke. It was common practice at the time to write
under pseudonymns or even the real names of others who were paid at times
for the practice. How wonderfully apt it must have been to have discovered
one called Shaksper or Shakspere, where a mere hyphen would instill the real
meaning, give the joke away to those with eyes to see.
Who knows? Even the true name "William" may have been viewed as part of the
joke in paying this man to use his name... the real author of the plays
"Will Shake [the] Spear" of Pallas Athena, the Spear-Shaker and the Greek
tenth muse and chief of all the muses....
Just some thoughts...
David Tame
David Tame
"David Tame" <da...@tame.freeserve.co.uk> wrote in message
news:b9o798$8lu$1...@news8.svr.pol.co.uk...
after all Shaksper's name has no hyphon). Why,
> then, the hyphon?
Hyphon / hyphen. Apologies for typos. In my case due to writing quickly; in
Bacon's case the many apparent typos well-planned as clues to other meanings
e.g. that very hyphenation.
Ah! And I tracked down more on Bacon and the use of "in" terms only used at
the time at Cambridge. William Clark in the 1800s made a list of all the
great alumni of Cambridge. In this list of great and famous men... the
country bumpkin "Shakespeare"! Now, Clark knew very well Shakesper hadn't
had any such education anywhere. Clearly he did know (at the very least have
cause to believe) that the secret author of the plays had, however, been an
alumni of Cambridge.
How many candidates attended Cambridge?
David T
John W. Kennedy
> The author of the plays displays a profound knowledge of:
> 1. Law. (The one Elizabeth champions practiced law; Shaksper - of course
> not.) This is not merely a passing knowledge but precise knowledge.
Rubbish. Tossing around the odd catchphrase is not "profound
knowledge", it's just a trick mastered by every successful writer of
fiction.
> 2. Politics. (Elizabeth's candidate was part of the Royal Court and also in
> Parliament. Shaksper - neither of course.)
Rubbish. Double rubbish, in fact, because Shakespeare _was_ part of the
Royal Court.
> 3. Academic learning. Shaksper went to no university, most of the other
> candidates did.
Rubbish. He never shows any special knowledge of subjects taught in
Elizabethan universities. He knows Latin, which was an _entrance_
_requirement_ to university, not a product.
> 4. The author knows Latin, Greek, Spanish, French, Italian. This is partly
> evidenced from his quoting and referring to works not then translated into
> English, and only available at the Courts of Europe. All impossible for
> Shaksper. Not for Bacon. Possibly not for other candidates.
He knows Latin. It is painfully obvious that he does not know Greek.
He does not show any particular command of Spanish or Italian, and only
displays significant French in a few brief passages in one play, for a
special reason. (Knowing Latin, he could probably, with difficulty,
read French, Spanish, and Italian -- and Catalan, Provençal, Sardinian,
and Portuguese, for that matter.)
> 5. Philosophy.
Of which he displays no special knowledge at all.
> 6. Intimate knowledge of European geography, including distances from place
> to place, as one having travelled there. How far did Shaksper travel?
Of which he displays nothing that could not easily be picked up, while
including boner after boner.
> 7. Actually, the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine (I
> admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at the time:
> not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
Even assuming this to be true (and I'd want citations), slang leaks. Or
hadn't you noticed?
> Of course, over half the folio plays had only been published or played
> anonymously before 1623. Someone around 1623 "decided" to put them under the
> name of Shake-Speare (with that curious hyphonation not otherwise used then
> or now for such a name - after all Shaksper's name has no hyphon).
And now we've descended into the outright lies....
Alan Jones
[...]
> ...the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine
> (I admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at
> the time: not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
Frankly, I don't believe these exclusively Cambridge terms exist in
Shakespeare, but am open to be persuaded by actual examples. You say you
have "sources" - please identify them and cite the Cambridge terms, so that
we can trace them in OED and in detailed histories of the University of
Cambridge.
Alan Jones
Elizabeth Weir
Oxford dropped by one afternoon to pick up his honorary
degree.
Three variations of the name "Marlowe" attended
Cambridge and another attended Oxford all in the
same time period.
Bob Grumman
>
>1. Law. (The one Elizabeth champions practiced law; Shaksper - of course
>not.) This is not merely a passing knowledge but precise knowledge.
This is opinion, wack. A double opinion, in fact: (1) that Shakespeare knew a
great deal about law, and (2) that he could not have gotten it without some kind
of formal education.
>2. Politics. (Elizabeth's candidate was part of the Royal Court and also in
>Parliament. Shaksper - neither of course.)
Same as above.
>3. Academic learning. Shaksper went to no university, most of the other
>candidates did.
Same as above.
>4. The author knows Latin, Greek, Spanish, French, Italian. This is partly
>evidenced from his quoting and referring to works not then translated into
>English, and only available at the Courts of Europe. All impossible for
>Shaksper. Not for Bacon. Possibly not for other candidates.
Same as above.
>5. Philosophy.
Same as above.
>6. Intimate knowledge of European geography, including distances from place
>to place, as one having travelled there. How far did Shaksper travel?
>
>7. Actually, the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine (I
>admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at the time:
>not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
But how do you explain the extensive knowledge of the planet Mars in the plays,
knowledge that only a Martian like Shakespeare of Stratford could have?
>Of course, over half the folio plays had only been published or played
>anonymously before 1623. Someone around 1623 "decided" to put them under the
>name of Shake-Speare (with that curious hyphonation not otherwise used then
>or now for such a name - after all Shaksper's name has no hyphon). Why,
>then, the hyphon?
This has been explained many times at HLAS, wack.
>The Shaker of the Speare was Pallas Athena, also apearing on frontiespieces
>of various Shake-Speare MSs. And Pallas Athena was the Muse Bacon has
>referred to.
>
>The author loved a good joke. It was common practice at the time to write
>under pseudonymns or even the real names of others who were paid at times
>for the practice. How wonderfully apt it must have been to have discovered
>one called Shaksper or Shakspere, where a mere hyphen would instill the real
>meaning, give the joke away to those with eyes to see.
>
>Who knows? Even the true name "William" may have been viewed as part of the
>joke in paying this man to use his name... the real author of the plays
>"Will Shake [the] Spear" of Pallas Athena, the Spear-Shaker and the Greek
>tenth muse and chief of all the muses....
>
>Just some thoughts...
>
>David Tame
To try uncharacteristically to be civil, I would say that there are experts in
all fields who believe that Shakespeare was an expert in those fields, but there
are also experts in the same fields who are sure he was not. There is no
factual evidence, such as the testimony of someone that he was--or was not--a
lawyer, to support an expert. Shakespeare's expertise is therefore a matter of
opinion. As for the rest of your very unoriginal opinions, they have been
refuted too much already at HLAS for me to want to take the time to refute them
again. I note, also, that you ignore all the factual evidence for Will
Shakespeare of Stratford.
--Bob G.
Bob Grumman
>the time at Cambridge.
Amazing scholarship that is able to find out what terms were used only at
Cambridge some 400 years ago!
>William Clark in the 1800s made a list of all the
>great alumni of Cambridge. In this list of great and famous men... the
>country bumpkin "Shakespeare"! Now, Clark knew very well Shakesper hadn't
>had any such education anywhere. Clearly he did know (at the very least have
>cause to believe) that the secret author of the plays had, however, been an
>alumni of Cambridge.
>
>How many candidates attended Cambridge?
>
>David T
Will Shakespeare of Stratford go seven degrees from Cambridge, which he attended
in 1567 through 1568. He also got degrees from Oxford, Padua, Paris, and
Wittenberg. These degrees were all destroyed by people trying to make it look
like Oxford wrote the plays, as were all records of Shakespeare's formal
education.
--Bob G.
Paul Crowley
news:DJTva.485$vP2...@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
From a post by Christian Lancai last June:
--------------------start of quote -----------------------
In "Timon of Athens", Timon to Apemantus:
"Hadst thou like us from our first swath proceeded
The sweet degrees that this brief world affords
....
Thy nature did commence in sufferance."
Only Cambridge graduates 'commence' in a faculty, which ceremony is
called 'the Commencement'. If he goes to a higher degree, he
proceedeth. The same kind of Cambridge university language is also
found in Henry IV and King Lear. Lear tells Regan in a rage:
"'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
What on earth does he mean by 'sizes'? 'Size' is a very peculiar
Cambridge term. It is a portion, a farthing of brew and drink which
scholars at Cambridge have at the buttery. To then be 'scanted of
sizes' was a punishment for undergraduates and an indignity revolting
enough to drive Lear at any length in his fury. It was a uniquely
Cambridge term, which you could only learn the hard way by being
subject to that very punishment - at Cambridge only, in the university
only.
Now, what about Dr John Caius? There are various doctors in the plays,
but only one is being ridiculed: Dr John Caius of Kay, founder of the
Caius College in Cambridge, who died in 1573, the very year when the
Bacon brothers went to Cambridge and when Oxford was at his most
active as a student there. Now, doctor Caius was an awesome authority.
He had been the Queen's physician, and he was wirthout an equal as a
medical expert in the realm. But he took himself too seriously. He
travelled widely on the continent and adopted foreign manners, which
especially the Queen found ludicrous. The character in MWW is a French
doctor and precisely a caricature of an eccentric with artifical
foreign manners. He was not popular with the students, and they were
not popular with him: he made a sport out of expelling fellows - there
were 20 expulsions in all authorized by him. He was exactly the right
sort of old fogey for students to ridicule and make fun of behind his
back, which Oxford certainly must have enjoyed taking part in, and
which the Bacons must have heard many stories and legends of
immediately after his death. The stories would certainly have
survived even to Marlowe's student days.
--------------------end of quote -----------------------
Christian's argument works fine until he comes to
Dr Caius. The author clearly knew the man and
had a strong personal animus against him. Caius
was dead long before Marlowe attended (and Bacon
only went up in September 1573, after the man had
died). Whereas Oxford was 14 years older than
Marlowe, and 11 years older than Bacon, and almost
certainly had personal experience of the man and of
the student riots he caused by his autocratic behaviour.
(While he was not enrolled as a student, his private
tutor was a highly respected Cambridge don; Oxford
lived nearby, and almost certainly attended lectures
and mixed with Cambridge students to some extent.
There is no great point to making fun of a man who is
long dead. Those scenes of the MWW were clearly
written before 1573 and played before an audience who
knew him. (Clue: He was well-known at court, having
been the Queen's physician.)
Paul.
Paul Crowley
> Paul Crowley wrote:
> > You forgot to articulate the Strat logic . . It wasn't
> > education; it wasn't his genes, his background
> > of illiteracy, his social connections, his 'mentor',
> > nor anything else. . . . so It could only have been
>
> That's a lie.
>
> It is true that it certainly wasn't education beyond what the works
> actually exhibit, which is a standard Elizabethan grammar-school
> education.
The works exhibit a damn sight more -- and you
know it. The author was superbly educated and,
UNlike most above-average university graduates
of his age (let alone most above-average grammar-
school graduates) would have been able to talk
confidently, intelligently and knowledgeably about
most topics of the day -- particularly of history and
politics. He had clearly engaged in numerous
conversation with others who had that capacity
from his earliest days. (And there weren't any in
Stratford-upon-Avon.)
> Genes, as any educated person knows, are nearly meaningless
> as a predictor of literary talent.
On the contrary, we could hardly get a better
predictor. Pick at random 1,000 individuals
who have an illiterate father; pick another
1,000 who have a close relative who has
published a book (say parent, aunt or uncle).
Which is more likely to produce authors?
You can find thousands of cases where
'literary talent' seems to have been inherited.
You can find almost no cases where an
author had an illiterate parent.
> He did not have a background of illiteracy.
Liar !
> He did, in fact, have _some_ social connections through his
> profession,
Are you referring to his supposed profession?
> but the supposition that social connections are necessary to
> the literary life is nothing but plain old snobbery (no doubt you
> pronounce your name "cro-LAY")
There are two ways of pronouncing it . . the
'English' -- as in 'crow' -- and the 'West Cork'
(which is where it comes from) where the
'ow' is as in 'cow' and is derived from the
Gaelic. I oscillate between them.
> but the supposition that social connections are necessary to
> the literary life is nothing but plain old snobbery (no doubt you
> pronounce your name "cro-LAY") and can empirically refuted a thousand
> times over.
We are not discussing 'necessary' but 'degrees
of probability'. Oxford University has produced
very many more authors than has the average
coal-mine or steel-works.
> We have no record of whether he had or did not have a
> "mentor", though he almost certainly did, theatre being what it is.
Strange that he never paid homage to the
man, or that no one ever mentioned him.
Still, what's new about 'strange' when it
comes to the Stratman?
Paul.
Greg Reynolds
> The author of the plays displays a profound knowledge of:
Profound? Ha, the guy's a writer. He was inking out lines, not
demonstrating his knowledge. Have you separated his own
profundity from the profundity of his source material yet?
> 1. Law. (The one Elizabeth champions practiced law; Shaksper - of course
> not.) This is not merely a passing knowledge but precise knowledge.
A pound of flesh was legal terminology? The guy is
strictly an entertainer, not a barrister! And he logged a
lot of documented trial time in his own personal life, as
we all aware.
> 2. Politics. (Elizabeth's candidate was part of the Royal Court and also in
> Parliament. Shaksper - neither of course.)
You NEED to familiarize yourself with the historical record, David.
James I named Shakespeare by name as a Groom of the Chamber
and decreed that his subjects would not interfere with their (the
King's Men) providing their creative works.
You are victimized by both a lack of knowledge and your buy-in to
well known, well flawed, and well refuted lies.
Shakespeare was indeed a royal servant as were his fellow
actors in the troupe, the same men mentioned in his will
and the producers of the first folio. Only Johnny Cochran
could lie his way out of that.
> 3. Academic learning. Shaksper went to no university, most of the other
> candidates did.
Shakespeare himself said it best in AYLI (you know, the play
with the Forest named after his mom):
"Yet he's gentle, never schooled and yet learned."
Why would your imagined Shakespeare refute your argument?
The term "never schooled and yet learned" might seem impossible
to you, but Shakespeare understood it.
Read the works and see that the wide range of characterizations
include aspects that only a WRITER could create. There are as
many rustic uneducated characters as there are courtly types.
They are the product of a writer, an observant creator.
> 4. The author knows Latin, Greek, Spanish, French, Italian. This is partly
> evidenced from his quoting and referring to works not then translated into
> English, and only available at the Courts of Europe. All impossible for
> Shaksper. Not for Bacon. Possibly not for other candidates.
You are obviously repeating old hackneyed barbs that you wish were valid,
but IF you researched, you'd know that Lady Mortimer in H IV, pt 1 speaks
only in WELSH and sings only in WELSH, which would show that a WRITER
was at work here and his command of the languages is negligible and is
portrayed only for the scope of the plays themselves.
If you need Bacon to be fluent in Welsh, ask Elizabeth Weir: she could
cook that up in about five minutes flat.
> 5. Philosophy.
Huh?
Here is Shakespeare's philosophy, it is the philosophy of
a WRITER:
O sir, we quarrel in print, by the book; as you have
books for good manners: I will name you the degrees.
The first, the Retort Courteous; the second, the
Quip Modest; the third, the Reply Churlish; the
fourth, the Reproof Valiant; the fifth, the
Countercheque Quarrelsome; the sixth, the Lie with
Circumstance; the seventh, the Lie Direct. All
these you may avoid but the Lie Direct; and you may
avoid that too, with an If. I knew when seven
justices could not take up a quarrel, but when the
parties were met themselves, one of them thought but
of an If, as, 'If you said so, then I said so;' and
they shook hands and swore brothers. Your If is the
only peacemaker; much virtue in If.
--Touchstone
Want more of Shakespeare's philosophy? Try this....
...One man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
--Jaques
So, that's the infant, the school-boy, the lover, the soldier,
the justice, the aged, and the senile. That is Shakespeare's
philosophy. Where is there any stage of man about nobility,
court, power, influence, or stature? Doesn't have one!
Please show any philosophy portrayed in the works that
you find impossible for this named author to have known
and understood.
Yours are just hackneyed brand "x" condemnations, silly
hand-me-downs from antiStrats who are driven not by fact but by spite.
> 6. Intimate knowledge of European geography, including distances from place
> to place, as one having travelled there. How far did Shaksper travel?
This is plain dumb. Did your candidate visit Alexandria or did he wing it?
Naples?
WOW, Queen Elizabeth never left England either! How ever could she understand
the tantalizing complexities of the geography presented.
Not to mention the absolute inaccuracies that even Jonson laughed at!
> 7. Actually, the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine (I
> admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at the time:
> not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
If I mention hasty pudding, am I automatically a harvard man?
Please separate *writing* from *doing* or *being.*
Writers owe us no explanation for their "knowledge."
And this man used a plethora of sources, whatever he wanted.
It is likely the audience had a Cambridge make-up and THAT
is the purpose. That's why there are Russians in LLL, it was
contrived to entertain Russians in the audience.
> Of course, over half the folio plays had only been published or played
> anonymously before 1623. Someone around 1623 "decided" to put them under the
> name of Shake-Speare (with that curious hyphonation not otherwise used then
> or now for such a name - after all Shaksper's name has no hyphon). Why,
> then, the hyphon?
Hyphens can be punctuation and/or spelling variances, two areas of
Elizabethan writing that were not consistent then, and not similar
to our modern usage. But the men who produced the First Folio
were not being cagey--they named a man they were well associated
with both in James' court AND in Stratford.
> The Shaker of the Speare was Pallas Athena, also apearing on frontiespieces
> of various Shake-Speare MSs. And Pallas Athena was the Muse Bacon has
> referred to.
Why didn't Bacon earn the million pounds then?
> The author loved a good joke. It was common practice at the time to write
> under pseudonymns or even the real names of others who were paid at times
> for the practice.
It can't be an artistic pseudonym if the name is in use currently
by a living person in the profession. Since you didn't know James I named
Shakespeare to his royal troupe, you are forgiven for thinking that would
be a suitable pseudonym. But it would be as pointlessly obvious as if
I called myself Diana-Price or Paul-Crowley.
> How wonderfully apt it must have been to have discovered
> one called Shaksper or Shakspere, where a mere hyphen would instill the real
> meaning, give the joke away to those with eyes to see.
>
> Who knows? Even the true name "William" may have been viewed as part of the
> joke in paying this man to use his name... the real author of the plays
> "Will Shake [the] Spear" of Pallas Athena, the Spear-Shaker and the Greek
> tenth muse and chief of all the muses....
The joke would be on the IDIOT who forwent the million pounds
Shakespeare earned in his place. That would defeat the premise that
an intelligent man wrote the works.
> Just some thoughts...
>
> David Tame
Don't quit your day job.
Greg Reynolds
David Tame
"Alan Jones" <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
news:DJTva.485$vP2...@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
> [...]
> > ...the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine
> > (I admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at
> > the time: not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
>
>
> Frankly, I don't believe these exclusively Cambridge terms exist in
> Shakespeare, but am open to be persuaded by actual examples. You say you
> have "sources" - please identify them
Alan, I agree that was "journalistic" of me. I understand it's one tiny
detail of a forthcoming book; and can see it's not worth citing without more
detail. So that'll be coming in the book. It seems unfair of me to cite the
author of the book without his permission and he's hard at work. Watch this
space.
Paul Crowley may have hit some of the targets in his post.
David T
David Tame
> David Tame wrote:
> Read the works and see that the wide range of characterizations
> include aspects that only a WRITER could create. There are as
> many rustic uneducated characters as there are courtly types.
I should think the most obvious fact of all in the authorship debate is that
the author was an author i.e. writer. And plainly it is possible for one of
the Court to have knowledge of the other classes. Given the size even of
London in those days, many of the populace will have known each other at
least by sight, and known of each other.
> > The Shaker of the Speare was Pallas Athena, also apearing on
frontiespieces
> > of various Shake-Speare MSs. And Pallas Athena was the Muse Bacon has
> > referred to.
>
> Why didn't Bacon earn the million pounds then?
To do that, he might just as well have had his name under the titles from
Day 1, of course.
If 'tis idiotic not to pick up the money you are owed for your work, how
come Shaksper was not paid as author of many of the plays, but only paid as
the actor within them? At times when he well could have used the money.
David T
John W. Kennedy
> The works exhibit a damn sight more -- and you
> know it. The author was superbly educated and,
> UNlike most above-average university graduates
> of his age (let alone most above-average grammar-
> school graduates) would have been able to talk
> confidently, intelligently and knowledgeably about
> most topics of the day -- particularly of history and
> politics.
Sorry, but knowing more about history and politics than _you_ does not
an expert make. His history is out of the Elizabethan equivalent of
Time-Life coffeetable books, and his politics amount to, "Civil war is bad."
>>He did not have a background of illiteracy.
> Liar !
Telling lies won't help you, Paulie-boy. We DO NOT KNOW about his
parents' literacy, although we do know that his father was a councilor
and High Bailiff, in a town that had enough respect for literacy to
subsidize a free grammar school.
>>He did, in fact, have _some_ social connections through his
>>profession,
> Are you referring to his supposed profession?
I am referring to the well-documented fact that, as a member of the
King's Men (and its predecessors), he was a servant to nobility, and,
ultimately, royalty.
> We are not discussing 'necessary' but 'degrees
> of probability'. Oxford University has produced
> very many more authors than has the average
> coal-mine or steel-works.
Take a coin. Toss it 100 times. No matter what the results were, the
odds of it happening were 1,267,650,600,228,229,401,496,703,205,375 to 1
against.
> Strange that he never paid homage to the
> man, or that no one ever mentioned him.
Not strange at all, for it is not commonly found. (I don't know of any
instance before the 20th century.)
John W. Kennedy
> To try uncharacteristically to be civil, I would say that there are experts in
> all fields who believe that Shakespeare was an expert in those fields, but there
> are also experts in the same fields who are sure he was not.
Hell, I once had a NJ State Supreme Court justice believing I was a
lawyer, and I wasn't even trying to deceive him. It takes little more
than literacy and a little wit.
Elizabeth Weir
> The author of the plays displays a profound knowledge of:
>
> 5. Philosophy.
This is where 19th c. Baconians had their opening but they chose
instead to attack the Strats on the basis of Bacon's knowledge
of the law.
Although it's ridiculous to assume that the Stratford Shakespeare
was familiar with "cautel," a fairly obscure legal term in the civil
law of Scotland, let alone able to make multiple puns on "cautel,"
Strats can nevertheless come up Strats will nevertheless come up with
a string of lame Strat Excuses; the Burgher bought a bin of law books
in a 'barrow,' yap yap yap.
Strats can fake a lawyer ["his father was engaged in multiple petty
law suits"--I'm not making that one up] but what they can't produce
is a philosopher of the first order.
David Tame
Elizabeth (hi), I must disagree with you. Of course, there's absolutely
profound philosophy in the Shakespeare works - not just obviously profound
philosophy, but also with deeper meanings only caught upon close scrutiny.
They are certainly philosophical. However I see no problem with this in
regard to Shaksper having written it all. We don't know if he was in fact
such a profound visionary, I admit: he certainly left no letters to prove
it, nor straight philosophy. But surely he could have bought a bin of law
books in a 'barrow'? Why, there was even a book shop nearby - it may have
had a tome or two (no longer extant) from which to quote, surely?
Then he could have included this profound thinking into his plays, acted in
them, been paid for acting in them, but (since he felt he'd pilfered some of
the philosophy), graciously often declined (as records show) the much larger
sum due the author of the plays (often there was no payment accounted to the
author, though we have records of all other payments in some instances).
After all, it was only money, and philosophers (such as Shakespeare) have
their heads in the clouds.
Oh, yes, yes. I know what you'll say. No doubt you'll quote Francis Bacon
himself from "The Essay of Friendship" as found only in the 1607 & 1612
edition, where he writes:
"There be some whose lives are as if they perpetually played a part upon a
stage, disguised to all others,
open only to themselves."
Oh, and then you might quip that in Tobie Matthew's letter to Bacon , in
1623, written from France, we read: "The most prodigious wit, that ever I
knew of my nation, and of this side of the sea, is of your Lordship's name,
though he be known by another."
But it probably means nothing. Mead was about in those days, and Essex had
the monopoly on sweet wine.
What is that I detect you think in reply? That in 1603, Bacon wrote to a
friend of his, the poet, John Davis, who had gone north to meet the King:
"So desiring you to be good to concealed poets, I continue, yours very
assured, Fr. Bacon."
Francis Bacon, a concealed poet? Surely not. Even if he did write so of
himself. Why, since a newcomer is continually reminded along the lines "This
was discussed and dealt with in HLAS in 1996" and etc., etc., they've surely
found perfectly good reasons for these and a thousand other instances, yes?
E'en myself, right off the top of my head I have it: So Bacon, then, was a
concealed poet. (One who writes poetry, and is known by many to do so, yet
doesn't come out with it in his own name.) You know, if I wrote poetry, and
it was simply appalling, I might keep it concealed myself! That's it, yes?
But wait! Bacon is known to have written Sonnets! They are known and exist!
(Oh, but true, therefore are not concealed, I give you.)
What is this you say? That in a letter to Count Gondomar, Ambassador from
the Court of Spain, dated 6th June, 1621, Bacon writes: "Now that at once my
age, my fortunes, and my genius, to which I have hitherto done but scanty
justice, call me from the stage of active life, I shall devote myself to
letters, instruct the actors on it, and serve posterity. In such a course, I
shall, perhaps find honour. And I shall thus pass my life as within the
verge of a better."
You've got me there. I admit it. Bacon spending his last five years devoting
himself to "letters" (authoring), in combination with the instruction of
actors?? Please tell, I know HLAS has dealt with this one. Which post and
year? Or might I save myself the trouble? I can already imagine that perhaps
Bacon discovered some ingenious means whereby his works of philosophy might
be acted out on the stage?
If Novum Organum could somehow have been acted, that would explain
everything here. It might even explain one of the 32 poems published
together upon Bacon's death (mighty strange they all are), this one of which
goes.
".ah! the tenth Muse and the glory of the choir has perished. Ah! never
before has Apollo himself been truly unhappy! Whence will there be another
to love him so? Ah! he is no longer going to have the full number; and
unavoidable is it now for Apollo to be content with nine Muses."
No, no, no. I see no reason to perceive anything of interest in Bacon being
called, over and over, by so many of his contemporaries, a "Muse". And what
was that, above? That he was "the tenth Muse"? Ha! I can see where this is
going already. Yes, yes, yes, this is a poem in praise of Bacon upon his
death, and "the tenth Muse" is in Greek mythology Pallas Athena, the Shaker
of the Spear. Alright, so Bacon, admittedly, was being called upon his death
"the Shaker of the Spear". I expect your point is that this was some form of
clue, a witty jest to those in the know. Have you never heard of
coincidence? (Or that sweet wine Essex enjoyed the monopoly of, and could
spread around to his pals?)
Well, must close. Nighttime here. To sleep, perchance to dream of Ben
Jonson, since it seems he's a very heartily revered fellow on HLAS. Deserves
it all too, I'd say.
Yawn. Must go. Starting to dream already. But before I do, what was it
Jonson once wrote? Oh, yes, he enumerated sixteen of the "greatest wits" of
his day. And he knew Shaksper, right? So allow me a placid dream, and tell
as I lay my head of his eulogy upon Shaksper.
Mmm? Nothing? Jonson didn't rate Shaksper among the top 16? Strange.
And what?? He did include Bacon? Surely he ranked lowly, however, with one
as able-minded as Jonson? Mmm? He wrote of Bacon:
"it is he who hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our tongue
which may be compared or preferred either to insolent Greece or haughty
Rome. . . . . So that he may be named the mark and acme of our language."
(Discoveries, Dominus Verulamius and Scriptorum Catalogus).
Egad! And I was just drifting off.
You've got me up and thinking now, darnation! All I wanted to do was sleep
in peace, and now you've forced me up and thinking...
David T
Bob Grumman
>
>"Alan Jones" <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:DJTva.485$vP2...@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
>
>> David Tame wrote:
>> [...]
>> > ...the author uses terms, acording to other sources of mine
>> > (I admittedly would not know) only at use at Cambridge University at
>> > the time: not even at Oxford, etc. Bacon went to Cambridge. Shaksper?
>>
>> Frankly, I don't believe these exclusively Cambridge terms exist in
>> Shakespeare, but am open to be persuaded by actual examples. You say you
>> have "sources" - please identify them and cite the Cambridge terms, so that
>> we can trace them in OED and in detailed histories of the University of
>> Cambridge.
>
>From a post by Christian Lancai last June:
>--------------------start of quote -----------------------
>
>In "Timon of Athens", Timon to Apemantus:
>"Hadst thou like us from our first swath proceeded
>The sweet degrees that this brief world affords
>....
>Thy nature did commence in sufferance."
>
>Only Cambridge graduates 'commence' in a faculty, which ceremony is
>called 'the Commencement'. If he goes to a higher degree, he
>proceedeth. The same kind of Cambridge university language is also
>found in Henry IV and King Lear. Lear tells Regan in a rage:
How would even the Renaissance Genius Francis DeVere be allowed to use these
SECRET TERMS in a PLAY???!!!!
>"'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
>
> What on earth does he mean by 'sizes'? 'Size' is a very peculiar
>Cambridge term. It is a portion, a farthing of brew and drink which
>scholars at Cambridge have at the buttery. To then be 'scanted of
>sizes' was a punishment for undergraduates and an indignity revolting
>enough to drive Lear at any length in his fury.
But Lear lived before there was a Cambridge. So we have a joke, yes? (I assume
only bishops and Cardinals served anything to scholars at Cambridge since only
they could be expected to keep terms like "sizes" secret.
>It was a uniquely
>Cambridge term, which you could only learn the hard way by being
>subject to that very punishment - at Cambridge only, in the university
>only.
What an incredibly stupid remark. You'd only hear about "sizes" at Cambridge if
you were deprived of them?!
>Now, what about Dr John Caius? There are various doctors in the plays,
>but only one is being ridiculed: Dr John Caius of Kay, founder of the
>Caius College in Cambridge, who died in 1573, the very year when the
>Bacon brothers went to Cambridge and when Oxford was at his most
>active as a student there. Now, doctor Caius was an awesome authority.
>He had been the Queen's physician, and he was wirthout an equal as a
>medical expert in the realm. But he took himself too seriously. He
>travelled widely on the continent and adopted foreign manners, which
>especially the Queen found ludicrous. The character in MWW is a French
>doctor and precisely a caricature of an eccentric with artifical
>foreign manners. He was not popular with the students, and they were
>not popular with him: he made a sport out of expelling fellows - there
>were 20 expulsions in all authorized by him. He was exactly the right
>sort of old fogey for students to ridicule and make fun of behind his
>back, which Oxford certainly must have enjoyed taking part in, and
>which the Bacons must have heard many stories and legends of
>immediately after his death. The stories would certainly have
>survived even to Marlowe's student days.
>
>--------------------end of quote -----------------------
>
>Christian's argument works fine until he comes to
>Dr Caius. The author clearly knew the man and
>had a strong personal animus against him.
Clearly.
>Caius was dead long before Marlowe attended (and Bacon
>only went up in September 1573, after the man had
>died). Whereas Oxford was 14 years older than
>Marlowe, and 11 years older than Bacon, and almost
>certainly had personal experience of the man and of
>the student riots he caused by his autocratic behaviour.
>(While he was not enrolled as a student, his private
>tutor was a highly respected Cambridge don; Oxford
>lived nearby, and almost certainly attended lectures
>and mixed with Cambridge students to some extent.
>
>There is no great point to making fun of a man who is
>long dead.
Right, Paul. One does not mock a person in literature to reveal universal
absurdities, but only to get at someone living. I didn't think it possible that
there was something about literature that you knew less about than you do about
poetry, but comedy may be it.
>Those scenes of the MWW were clearly
>written before 1573 and played before an audience who
>knew him. (Clue: He was well-known at court, having
>been the Queen's physician.)
>
>Paul.
And no one was allowed to talk about him outside the court.
--Bob G.
Greg Reynolds
> "Greg Reynolds" <eve...@core.com> wrote in message
> news:3EC05DA1...@core.com...
> > David Tame wrote:
> > Read the works and see that the wide range of characterizations
> > include aspects that only a WRITER could create. There are as
> > many rustic uneducated characters as there are courtly types.
>
> I should think the most obvious fact of all in the authorship debate is that
> the author was an author i.e. writer. And plainly it is possible for one of
> the Court to have knowledge of the other classes. Given the size even of
> London in those days, many of the populace will have known each other at
> least by sight, and known of each other.
Being a writer is the main qualification.
Your pontifications that Shakespeare must be educated
or well traveled are false restrictions with no basis. That he be
multilingual, or hold a law degree is your own problem, not his.
(Not that you substantiated your position or anything.)
You'd be hard-pressed to explain which university taught
him to be Shakespeare and why his classmates didn't then
also become Shakespeares. I GUESS IT ISN'T TAUGHT
IN SCHOOL!
By ignoring my queries, you weakened your stance. Wow.
> > > The Shaker of the Speare was Pallas Athena, also apearing on
> frontiespieces
> > > of various Shake-Speare MSs. And Pallas Athena was the Muse Bacon has
> > > referred to.
> >
> > Why didn't Bacon earn the million pounds then?
>
> To do that, he might just as well have had his name under the titles from
> Day 1, of course.
Shakespeare didn't duck any of your conditions. He is honest.
The best you could HOPE to provide is for some other DISHONEST writer
to be masquerading as Shakespeare! GOOD LUCK! Count the wannabes some time!
What a stupid endeavor you've chosen for yourself!
WHY WOULD YOU BOTHER when history rejects you?
> If 'tis idiotic not to pick up the money you are owed for your work, how
> come Shaksper was not paid as author of many of the plays,
He was a royal servant with fellows (partners) in his troupe and
fellows (partners) in his theater ownership. They made out well
and they had NO CONTROVERSIES that you and other naysayers
pretend existed. Get real.
> but only paid as
> the actor within them? At times when he well could have used the money.
Again, you need a grasp of the detail. He obviously earned a good living
in a relationship of his own making and documented by the king of England
and the King's Men!
Forget my opinions--you need to refute the words of Henry Condell and
John Heminge. They were his fellows in the acting company AND in the
ownership of the venues! They were all church-going family men with
longstanding ties in London and they all became wealthy on Shakespeare's
plays. Who are you to deny their own unsolicited testimonies?
Why would your words overrule theirs?
I have a feeling you are another loudmouth with no foundation. If you
ignore history you hurt yourself, not Shakespeare.
GRReg Reynolds
Alan Jones
>[...]
..."the tenth Muse" is in Greek
> mythology Pallas Athena, the Shaker of the Spear.
Which Greek author identifies Athena as a tenth Muse? A quick internet
search suggests only Sappho of Lesbos as having, extravagantly, been so
acclaimed. Nor do I readily grasp how the Muses, attendant upon Apollo,
could include one of the great Goddesses.
Incidentally, over what art do you suggest Bacon, as a tenth Muse, would
preside? He wouldn't be needed for tragedy (patron Muse, Melpomene), or
comedy (Thalia), or history (Clio), or love poetry (Erato). All of which
pretty well eliminates him as responsible for the works of Shakepeare.
Alan Jones
Paul Crowley
> >From a post by Christian Lancai last June:
> >Only Cambridge graduates 'commence' in a faculty, which ceremony is
> >called 'the Commencement'. If he goes to a higher degree, he
> >proceedeth. The same kind of Cambridge university language is also
> >found in Henry IV and King Lear. Lear tells Regan in a rage:
>
> How would even the Renaissance Genius Francis DeVere be allowed to use these
> SECRET TERMS in a PLAY???!!!!
There is nothing 'secret' about these terms. But
they were known only to those who had attended
Cambridge university.
> >"'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
> >
> > What on earth does he mean by 'sizes'? 'Size' is a very peculiar
> >Cambridge term. It is a portion, a farthing of brew and drink which
> >scholars at Cambridge have at the buttery. To then be 'scanted of
> >sizes' was a punishment for undergraduates and an indignity revolting
> >enough to drive Lear at any length in his fury.
>
> But Lear lived before there was a Cambridge. So we have a joke, yes?
Not really. Lear lived before they spoke English.
But, while a play written in ancient Celtic would
have been more historically accurate, it probably
wouldn't have been very successful on any
Elizabethan stage.
> >It was a uniquely
> >Cambridge term, which you could only learn the hard way by being
> >subject to that very punishment - at Cambridge only, in the university
> >only.
>
> What an incredibly stupid remark. You'd only hear about "sizes" at Cambridge if
> you were deprived of them?!
It's not my remark, and I agree that the author had
probably not suffered the penalty (although he may
well have done so). However, he would have heard
it spoken in context by other students, and noted it
for later use.
> >Caius was dead long before Marlowe attended (and Bacon
> >only went up in September 1573, after the man had
> >died). Whereas Oxford was 14 years older than
> >Marlowe, and 11 years older than Bacon, and almost
> >certainly had personal experience of the man and of
> >the student riots he caused by his autocratic behaviour.
> >(While he was not enrolled as a student, his private
> >tutor was a highly respected Cambridge don; Oxford
> >lived nearby, and almost certainly attended lectures
> >and mixed with Cambridge students to some extent.
> >
> >There is no great point to making fun of a man who is
> >long dead.
>
> Right, Paul. One does not mock a person in literature to reveal universal
> absurdities, but only to get at someone living. I didn't think it possible that
> there was something about literature that you knew less about than you do about
> poetry, but comedy may be it.
Can you give any examples of bitter mockery in
a play (or in a similar work, such as a TV film)
against some quite obscure figure (whom the
playwright had never met) and who died more
than twenty years before it was written?
No . . of course not. Well, can you give me any
remotely likely scenario? For example, when I
was at university there was a real bastard of a
dean, by the name of 'Tierney'. You obviously did
not know him, and he died over 20 years ago.
But how about putting him into one YOUR plays?
Following Shake-speare's example, it would not
be a play about a university -- so you would not
show him in his original setting, but doing quite
different things. You will slate the man --
particularly his accent and other personal
characteristics, just because that's what you
want to do.
How does that idea grab you?
> >Those scenes of the MWW were clearly
> >written before 1573 and played before an audience who
> >knew him. (Clue: He was well-known at court, having
> >been the Queen's physician.)
>
> And no one was allowed to talk about him outside the court.
The only people who talked about him were
those who knew him. But (and you may find
this strange on your planet) after he retired and
died, people lost interest in him and only rarely
bothered to recall him to memory.
Paul.
David Tame
Muse as in Muse: inspirer of all and unrestricted.
As to the origin of the "tenth", since there were already nine, it seems
that any figure of greatness throughout history (even modern rock bands in
their names) therefore play upon being the ultimate or "tenth" Muse. There
are innumerable relationships between Bacon and Pallas (the Spear Shaker) -
and Shakespeare in general and Pallas, such as in her frequent apearances on
frontispieces (why??????).
As Ben Jonson broadly hinted regarding the Shakespeare / Pallas link as a
clue to deeper things in his somewhat awkward introductory verse to The
First Folio:
"In each of which he seemes to shake a lance, As brandish't at the eyes of
ignorance."
The Baconian site
http://www.sirbacon.org/athenaglobe.html
has it that:
Traditional muses did not suffice either. So he chose a tenth muse while he
was still in his teens in France. A letter Bacon received in 1582, from Jean
De la Jesse, personal secretary to the duc d'Anjou identifies his tenth
muse. Jesse asserts that his own Muse has been inspired by "Bacon's Pallas",
"bien que votre Pallas me rende mieux instruit".
Why Pallas Athena at all? A long story, enough for a book. Very briefly she
is patron of Justice, the Arts, Goddess of Wisdom, and much else beside.
When she shook her lance, Light flew out to strike down ignoarance.
Basically she was adopted as the symbolic patron of whomsoever peoples
(plural in some ways, I'd say) were behind the "Shake-Speare" works. For imo
the grand goal of the Works and many other endeavours beside the literature
were a planned scheme to replace ignorance with wisdom in England and
beyond.
Bacon is one who did write in his own philosophy on how the arts could be
used to influence people, of their long-term cultural importance; and of
course he is generally acknowledged as the father of the modern scientific
method of "test and see if it works - don't just verbally repeat received
wisdom" from which one may argue our modern civilisation is largely born in
terms of its science and technology. Before Bacon, of course, "science"
consisted merely of quoting Plato or Aristotle.
Somewhere I heard that at Cambridge in Bacon's day, they would debate
endlessly upon the subject - for example - of how many teeth has a horse? No
one ever thought to simply go out and count! Hence Bacon's frustration at
the "science" of his day which led to no progress whatsoever, and his great
philosophical works introducing a new practical science.
David T
David Tame
"Alan Jones" <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
news:Pmrwa.13170$cn3....@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
> >[...]
> ..."the tenth Muse" is in Greek
> > mythology Pallas Athena, the Shaker of the Spear.
> [...]
>
> Which Greek author identifies Athena as a tenth Muse? A quick internet
> search suggests only Sappho of Lesbos as having, extravagantly, been so
> acclaimed. Nor do I readily grasp how the Muses, attendant upon Apollo,
> could include one of the great Goddesses.
You got me interested into delving further into that, Alan. From this and
that book here and there I learn that the Nine Muses are all considered to
be aspects of the one Supreme Muse, rather as the seven colours come from
white through a prism. You may not find it in Greek mythology, but it begins
at least as early as the mystics of Elizabethan England.
The "supreme Muse", as a symbol if you will, can therefore be more tangibly
referred to in terms of Pallas Athena, Mother Mary, the Virgin Queen,
Britannia , etc. The idea is there in The Faerie Queen, Book 1. The gentle,
holy man introduced into English literature there has as his sacred Muse the
"holy Virgin, chiefe of nine". So does this answer for you? Look to
Elizabethan literature itself. Continuing Faerie Queen: this greatest of all
Muses, chief of nine, is "Gloriana... Queene of Faerie land."
This goes deep and the correspondences are many. For example in how some
frontispieces of Elizabethan literature play upon correlating Pallas Athena
(sitting or standing with her traditional shield and Spear) with Elizabeth I
herself. We then get correlations between Pallas Athena and Britannia. (Many
of our coins until recently, and the 50 pence piece still, depict Britannia
seated with shield, trident - spear - and helmet. Pallas also famous for her
shield, spear, and helmet. So Britannia is a more modern version of Palas
Athena. Or Pallas Athena is Britannia.)
Whoever were behind the "Shakespeare" and other works of the day, they were
sometimes at pains to create this image of a patron Goddess or Muse of
England / Britain, whether we call her Britannia or Pallas. "Shakespeare"
called her Pallas Athena obviously, hence the many allusions and clues to
spear-shaking, by "Shakespeare", Jonson and others.
But more - Elizabeth I is included into the symbology. Some frontispiece
depictions appear to play artfully as partly Elizabeth and partly Pallas,
half-human, half-divine. The "Virgin Queen" then had to somehow play the
role! She can't have been at all sorry to have been exonerated so. But
playing a "Virgin Queen" - to whatever extent she willingly went along or
really understood - was not easy for her. And anyone truly believing she was
a virgin is imho foolish, hence the idea that there may have been offspring
is to the point, but that's another story.
If all this is a little too esoteric concerning correlations between Pallas
Athena the Spear Shaker, Britannia, Elizabeth I and the general concept of a
Faery or Virgin Queen, to sum up:
in answer to your question: one place to look for the "tenth Muse" is in
Faery Queen, Book 1. (Which, while attributed to "Spencer" I'd say relates
to the whole "Shakespeare" canon as an early example.) And earlier today I
posted one example that Bacon, in his teens in France, chose a "tenth Muse"
as one to be above all others. The citation I gave could probably be tracked
down closer still to source. Hope that helps, and it helped prod me into
digging further, for which thanks.
David T
Alan Jones
> "Alan Jones" <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:Pmrwa.13170$cn3....@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
>> David Tame wrote:
>>> [...]
>> ..."the tenth Muse" is in Greek
>>> mythology Pallas Athena, the Shaker of the Spear.
>> [...]
>>
>> Which Greek author identifies Athena as a tenth Muse?
> Muse as in Muse: inspirer of all and unrestricted.
You specifically stated that Athena was the tenth Muse in Greek mythology. I
repeat: What is your source for that statement?
> As to the origin of the "tenth", since there were already nine, it
> seems that any figure of greatness throughout history (even modern
> rock bands in their names) therefore play upon being the ultimate or
> "tenth" Muse. There are innumerable relationships between Bacon and
> Pallas (the Spear Shaker) - and Shakespeare in general and Pallas,
> such as in her frequent apearances on frontispieces (why??????).
Which frontispieces specifically? How frequently?
> As Ben Jonson broadly hinted regarding the Shakespeare / Pallas link
> as a clue to deeper things in his somewhat awkward introductory verse
> to The First Folio:
>
> "In each of which he seemes to shake a lance, As brandish't at the
> eyes of ignorance."
[...]
Clumsy? No "hint" here, surely - just a little compliment to Wm.Shakespeare,
Gent., referring to the family's hard-won armorial device.
Alan Jones
KQKnave
<da...@tame.freeserve.co.uk> writes:
>As Ben Jonson broadly hinted regarding the Shakespeare / Pallas link as a
>clue to deeper things in his somewhat awkward introductory verse to The
>First Folio:
>
>"In each of which he seemes to shake a lance, As brandish't at the eyes of
>ignorance."
Jonson doesn't mention a thing about Pallas. This topic has been done
to death here at HLAS and the purported Shakespeare/Pallas/Athena/Minerva
connection has been demolished. I suggest that anyone interested in the subject
consult the Google archives, especially the posts written by Terry Ross. Also,
a compendium of occurrences together of the words "spear" and "shake" from the
12th century through 1640 can be found here at the Kathman/Ross website:
http://www.shakespeareauthorship.com/spershak.html
See my demolition of Monsarrat's RES paper!
http://hometown.aol.com/kqknave/monsarr1.html
The Droeshout portrait is not unusual at all!
http://hometown.aol.com/kqknave/shakenbake.html
Agent Jim
Alan Jones
> "Alan Jones" <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:Pmrwa.13170$cn3....@news-binary.blueyonder.co.uk...
>> David Tame wrote:
>>> [...]
>> ..."the tenth Muse" is in Greek
>>> mythology Pallas Athena, the Shaker of the Spear.
>> [...]
>>
>> Which Greek author identifies Athena as a tenth Muse? A quick
>> internet search suggests only Sappho of Lesbos as having,
>> extravagantly, been so acclaimed. Nor do I readily grasp how the
>> Muses, attendant upon Apollo, could include one of the great
>> Goddesses.
>
> You got me interested into delving further into that, Alan. From this
What books? By whom? With what reputation?
...I learn that the Nine Muses are all
> considered to be aspects of the one Supreme Muse, rather as the seven
> colours come from white through a prism.
They are actually handmaidens of Apollo, who is depicted among them with his
lyre. Their individual arts are all subject to his divine inspiration. Look
at a few Renaissance paintings and see for yourself. No connection with
Athena.
You may not find it in Greek
> mythology, ...
It was you, not I, that related the tenth Muse to Greek mythology. Are you
backing off now?
> but it begins at least as early as the mystics of
> Elizabethan England.
>
> The "supreme Muse", as a symbol if you will, can therefore be more
> tangibly referred to in terms of Pallas Athena, Mother Mary, the
> Virgin Queen, Britannia , etc.
Are you asserting that any virgin woman with a helmet and spear is somehow
Athena? Or that warlike Athena is in any way comparable with the peaceable
Blessed Virgin?
> he idea is there in The Faerie Queen,
> Book 1. The gentle, holy man introduced into English literature there
> has as his sacred Muse the "holy Virgin, chiefe of nine".
But if she's chief of [scil. 'among'] nine, she can't be the tenth. Actually
she's Calliope, the chief of the nine Muses, inspirer of epic poetry, and
by invoking her Spenser is here imitating Homer and Virgil (and also laying
claim to be England's epic poet). Milton was eventually to aim higher, in
his epic for the human race, by invokng the Holy Spirit as his muse.
> So does
> this answer for you?
No, of course not.
Look to Elizabethan literature itself.
> Continuing Faerie Queen: this greatest of all Muses, chief of nine,
> is "Gloriana... Queene of Faerie land."
Nonsense. She's Calliope. Gloriana is a distinct character in the poem.
> This goes deep and the correspondences are many. For example in how
> some frontispieces of Elizabethan literature play upon correlating
> Pallas Athena (sitting or standing with her traditional shield and
> Spear) with Elizabeth I herself. We then get correlations between
> Pallas Athena and Britannia. (Many of our coins until recently, and
> the 50 pence piece still, depict Britannia seated with shield,
> trident - spear - and helmet. Pallas also famous for her shield,
> spear, and helmet. So Britannia is a more modern version of Palas
> Athena. Or Pallas Athena is Britannia.)
A trident isn't a spear, and Britannia has one as an attribute of Nepture
the sea-god. Have you not noticed the lighthouse and rocks on the old coins?
>
> Whoever were behind the "Shakespeare" and other works of the day,
> they were sometimes at pains to create this image of a patron Goddess
> or Muse of England / Britain, whether we call her Britannia or
> Pallas. "Shakespeare" called her Pallas Athena obviously,...
Give us a quotation from the Shakespeare plays or poems to support this
statement.
> hence the
> many allusions and clues to spear-shaking, by "Shakespeare", Jonson
> and others.
Many allusions? Give us half-a-dozen, then, where spear-shaking is not
literally intended.
> But more - Elizabeth I is included into the symbology. Some
> frontispiece depictions appear to play artfully as partly Elizabeth
> and partly Pallas, half-human, half-divine.
Or is she shown as just a divinely regal woman, in part-armour as commander
of her army and navy? How can you tell that the depictions are specifically
of Eliz. as Pallas
Athena?
> The "Virgin Queen" then
> had to somehow play the role! She can't have been at all sorry to
> have been exonerated so. But playing a "Virgin Queen" - to whatever
> extent she willingly went along or really understood - was not easy
> for her. And anyone truly believing she was a virgin is imho foolish,
> hence the idea that there may have been offspring is to the point,
> but that's another story.
>
> If all this is a little too esoteric concerning correlations between
> Pallas Athena the Spear Shaker, Britannia, Elizabeth I and the
> general concept of a Faery or Virgin Queen, to sum up:
>
> in answer to your question: one place to look for the "tenth Muse" is
> in Faery Queen, Book 1. (Which, while attributed to "Spencer" ...
Do you mean you don't think Edmund Spenser wrote it? Evidence? There's
plenty to show he was indeed the author. Have you read the poem and a
scholarly biography of Spenser? Or are you relying on some pretty dubious
secondary or tertiary sources? You still haven't cited the authors whose
arguments you summarise.
> ...I'd say
> relates to the whole "Shakespeare" canon as an early example.) And
> earlier today I posted one example that Bacon, in his teens in
> France, chose a "tenth Muse" as one to be above all others. The
> citation I gave could probably be tracked down closer still to
> source. Hope that helps, and it helped prod me into digging further,
> for which thanks.
Stop digging and think rationally..
Alan Jones
Elizabeth Weir
[...]
>
> > 2. Politics. (Elizabeth's candidate was part of the Royal Court and also in
> > Parliament. Shaksper - neither of course.)
>
> Rubbish. Double rubbish, in fact, because Shakespeare _was_ part of the
> Royal Court.
Shakspere was never invited to Court. Odd, doncha think
since lesser poets were invited to Court in droves. Jonson
was there, so was Chapman and Sylvester and they and others
were lobbing poetic salvos at Shakespeare in the Poetomachia
that took place at Court but Shakespeare wasn't there. At
least not under that pseudonym.
> > 3. Academic learning. Shaksper went to no university, most of the other
> > candidates did.
>
> Rubbish. He never shows any special knowledge of subjects taught in
> Elizabethan universities. He knows Latin, which was an _entrance_
> _requirement_ to university, not a product.
Can you think of a reason why these "unlearned plays"--and the
Shakespeare plays *are unlearned* compared to nearly all the other
Elizabethan playwrights who so stuffed their plays with classical
allusions that they bored their public--are still being mined
by scholars 400 years later?
Can you explain, Kennedy, why there are over 350,000 books, most
of them scholarly, written on the "unlearned" plays and sonnets?
Over 90,000 post-graduate theses on the "unlearned" Shakespeare works
were registered with the LOC by 1980--I don't have the latest
figures--and that's only the US tally. I have no idea how many
journal articles have been written on the "unlearned" Shakespeare
works--I would guess into the high hundreds of thousands--possibly over
a million and that's in English alone. Shakespeare has been mined in
hundreds of languages--the Germans were especially adept at
finding philosophies in the plays. I just saw a journal article
on the influence of pre-socratic philosophers in the Shakespeare
works.
So you're wrong, Kennedy. The Shakespeare works only appear
unlearned to Strats because Strats have been culturally inhibited
from reading the plays on any but the most superficial level
to preseve the Strat myth. Religious texts get the same treatment--
scholars are trained to ignore contradictions.
Bob Grumman
>> >Only Cambridge graduates 'commence' in a faculty, which ceremony is
>> >called 'the Commencement'. If he goes to a higher degree, he
>> >proceedeth. The same kind of Cambridge university language is also
>> >found in Henry IV and King Lear. Lear tells Regan in a rage:
>>
>> How would even the Renaissance Genius Francis DeVere be allowed to use these
>> SECRET TERMS in a PLAY???!!!!
>
Paul Crowley:
>There is nothing 'secret' about these terms. But
>they were known only to those who had attended
>Cambridge university.
All I can say is that you certainly have a strange notion of how the language
works, Paul. It's in keeping with your strange notion of how human beings
interact, however.
>> >"'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
>> >
>> > What on earth does he mean by 'sizes'? 'Size' is a very peculiar
>> >Cambridge term. It is a portion, a farthing of brew and drink which
>> >scholars at Cambridge have at the buttery. To then be 'scanted of
>> >sizes' was a punishment for undergraduates and an indignity revolting
>> >enough to drive Lear at any length in his fury.
>>
>> But Lear lived before there was a Cambridge. So we have a joke, yes?
>
>Not really. Lear lived before they spoke English.
>But, while a play written in ancient Celtic would
>have been more historically accurate, it probably
>wouldn't have been very successful on any
>Elizabethan stage.
The references to "sizes," a portion of drink unknown in Lear's day, is either
an anachronism, or a Crowleyan joke.
>> >It was a uniquely
>> >Cambridge term, which you could only learn the hard way by being
>> >subject to that very punishment - at Cambridge only, in the university
>> >only.
>>
>>What an incredibly stupid remark. You'd only hear about "sizes" at Cambridge if
>> you were deprived of them?!
>
>It's not my remark, and I agree that the author had
>probably not suffered the penalty (although he may
>well have done so). However, he would have heard
>it spoken in context by other students, and noted it
>for later use.
My point, which you seem not to see, is that "sizes" would have been used
in ordinary talk about drinking: Kit: "I used up my sizes for this term in two
days." Of course, he'd ONLY make such a remark to a fellow student or an
employee of Cambridge.
>> >Caius was dead long before Marlowe attended (and Bacon
>> >only went up in September 1573, after the man had
>> >died). Whereas Oxford was 14 years older than
>> >Marlowe, and 11 years older than Bacon, and almost
>> >certainly had personal experience of the man and of
>> >the student riots he caused by his autocratic behaviour.
>> >(While he was not enrolled as a student, his private
>> >tutor was a highly respected Cambridge don; Oxford
>> >lived nearby, and almost certainly attended lectures
>> >and mixed with Cambridge students to some extent.
>> >
>> >There is no great point to making fun of a man who is
>> >long dead.
>>
>> Right, Paul. One does not mock a person in literature to reveal universal
>>absurdities, but only to get at someone living. I didn't think it possible that
>>there was something about literature that you knew less about than you do about
>> poetry, but comedy may be it.
>
>Can you give any examples of bitter mockery in
>a play (or in a similar work, such as a TV film)
>against some quite obscure figure (whom the
>playwright had never met) and who died more
>than twenty years before it was written?
I don't need to, Paul. My knowledge of comedy and the workings of the human
mind tell me it must be so. In any case, I don't have time to hunt for names.
So consider yourself a winner again. If you want to boast about asking someone
to spend a couple of weeks doing research of no value at all except to refute
you--who won't acknowledge the refutation, anyway.
>No . . of course not. Well, can you give me any
>remotely likely scenario? For example, when I
>was at university there was a real bastard of a
>dean, by the name of 'Tierney'. You obviously did
>not know him, and he died over 20 years ago.
>But how about putting him into one YOUR plays?
I've read about obscure characters and put them in my plays, but I don't think
I've ever used their real names. In an early play, I was quite amused by some
English eccentric who adopted a pre-teen girl and raised her in such a way as to
make her the ideal wife for him. I believe he married her.
Shakespeare, of course, did it with Monarcho, but you refuse to accept that.
And, no, I don't want to go through that debate again.
I'm not sure Shakespeare was referring to the Cambridge Caius, but I just can't
see why he could not have heard about him, thought him funny, and made a
character somewhat based on him--and named him Caius to amuse his Campbridge
friends.
>Following Shake-speare's example, it would not
>be a play about a university -- so you would not
>show him in his original setting, but doing quite
>different things. You will slate the man --
>particularly his accent and other personal
>characteristics, just because that's what you
>want to do.
No, Paul, I'd use the things I'd heard about him that seemed comic to me--which
might include his accent.
>How does that idea grab you?
It seems to me the kind of thing writers of comedy often do.
>> >Those scenes of the MWW were clearly
>> >written before 1573 and played before an audience who
>> >knew him. (Clue: He was well-known at court, having
>> >been the Queen's physician.)
>>
>> And no one was allowed to talk about him outside the court.
>
>The only people who talked about him were
>those who knew him.
And they only talked about him to each other, right?
>But (and you may find
>this strange on your planet) after he retired and
>died, people lost interest in him and only rarely
>bothered to recall him to memory.
>
>Paul.
It would not be strange if people stopped talking about him; but it would be
equally unstrange if people didn't continue to talk about him for a long time.
In the Monarcho threads, someone brought up an American West eccentric who was
joked about long after he died. And I just read a little write-up about Diamond
Jim Brady, an American eccentric know for extreme gluttony. I think he died in
1930 or so. A minor but colorful figure thought interesting enough to modern
high school students to write about in an auxiliary text for english
classes--for slow readers, in fact.
--Bob G.
Gary Kosinsky
Weir) wrote:
SNIP
>Can you explain, Kennedy, why there are over 350,000 books, most
>of them scholarly, written on the "unlearned" plays and sonnets?
>Over 90,000 post-graduate theses on the "unlearned" Shakespeare works
>were registered with the LOC by 1980--I don't have the latest
>figures--and that's only the US tally. I have no idea how many
>journal articles have been written on the "unlearned" Shakespeare
>works--I would guess into the high hundreds of thousands--possibly over
>a million and that's in English alone. Shakespeare has been mined in
>hundreds of languages--the Germans were especially adept at
>finding philosophies in the plays. I just saw a journal article
>on the influence of pre-socratic philosophers in the Shakespeare
>works.
I think Elizabeth is raising an interesting point here. If
one is to judge the 'learnedness' of Shakespeare by the number of
learned books and articles written about his works, then Shakespeare
probably was the most learned person ever to take pen (or quill) to
paper.
The thing I wonder about, though, is how many of these learned
theories and analyses were intentionally embedded by Shakespeare into
his works, and how many of them are simply being read into the works
by some very smart people.
It's always been my feeling that if Shakespeare could be
reincarnated today, he would be absolutely flabbergasted by the number
of learned works that have been written about his plays - "This guy
says I wrote this play to depict the existential dilemma of man!
Hell, I was just trying to pay my bar bill at the Mermaid!"
- Gary Kosinsky
Peter Farey
David Tame wrote:
>
> The Baconian site
> http://www.sirbacon.org/athenaglobe.html
> has it that:
> Traditional muses did not suffice either. So he chose a tenth
> muse while he was still in his teens in France. A letter Bacon
> received in 1582, from Jean De la Jesse, personal secretary to
> the duc d'Anjou identifies his tenth muse. Jesse asserts that
> his own Muse has been inspired by "Bacon's Pallas",
> "bien que votre Pallas me rende mieux instruit".
This was not in a letter, in fact, but in a sonnet addressed
to Francis, (undated) which we on HLAS tried translate back
in Nov/Dec 1998. The thread was "Sonnet X", started by me,
because at that time I suspected that 'La Jessée' might have
been a pseudonym for you-know-who. I know better now!
SONNET (by 'La Jessée')
CE qu'inspiré du Ciel, et plein d'affection,
Je comble si souvent ma bouche et ma poitrine,
Du sacré Nom fameus de ta Royne divine:
Ses valeurs en sont cause, et sa perfection.
Si ce siecle de fer, si mainte Nation
Ingratte á ses honneurs, n'avoit l'ame Aemantine:
Ravis de ce beau Nom qu'aus Graces je destine,
Avec eus nous l'aurions en admiration.
Donc (Baccon) s'il advient que ma Muse l'on vante,
Ce n'est pas qu'elle soit ou diserte, ou scavante:
Bien que vostre Pallas me rende mieus instruit.
C'est pource que mon Lut chante sa gloire sainte,
Ou qu'en ces vers nayfz son image est emprainte:
Ou que ta vertu claire en mon ombre reluit.
I found this poem among the Anthony Bacon papers in the
Lambeth Palace Library archives (MS.653 f.281), where
there is also a longer 'Elegy' by La Jessée, this time
addressed to *Anthony* (MS.661 ff.263-4). I recall with
some guilt that I promised to post it in full once I had
transcribed it, but still have done neither. Sorry Greg!
The first four lines (of 88), however, do have some
relevance to what you are discussing here.
BACCON, fleur des Angloys, et l'honneur des neuf Muses,
Des Muses, et Pallas: qui tristement confuses
Loing de leur cher Parnasse, errent parmy les bois,
Sans guide, sans recours, sans support, et sans voix.
Peter F.
pet...@rey.prestel.co.uk
http://www2.prestel.co.uk/rey/index.htm
Paul Crowley
> >> >It was a uniquely
> >> >Cambridge term, which you could only learn the hard way by being
> >> >subject to that very punishment - at Cambridge only, in the university
> >> >only.
> >>
> >>What an incredibly stupid remark. You'd only hear about "sizes" at Cambridge if
> >> you were deprived of them?!
> >
> >It's not my remark, and I agree that the author had
> >probably not suffered the penalty (although he may
> >well have done so). However, he would have heard
> >it spoken in context by other students, and noted it
> >for later use.
>
> My point, which you seem not to see, is that "sizes" would have been used
> in ordinary talk about drinking: Kit: "I used up my sizes for this term in two
> days." Of course, he'd ONLY make such a remark to a fellow student or an
> employee of Cambridge.
That is not the use in Lear -- which was
Lear to Regan: "'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
This is a good example of the accurate idiomatic
use of a phrase, where Stratfordians have to claim
that 'it all came from books' (or something equally
idiotic). It's similar to the argument over the use
of legal terms.
Leaning how to use such words and phrases
accurately takes time. You _don't_ pick them
up from books, nor from casual conversations
in pubs with lawyers (nor from Cambridge men).
The obvious simple explanation is that the poet
spent time at the university (and in legal studies)
where he extensively engaged in discussion
using such terms.
Of course Strats must desperately avoid all normal
obvious explanations.
> >Can you give any examples of bitter mockery in
> >a play (or in a similar work, such as a TV film)
> >against some quite obscure figure (whom the
> >playwright had never met) and who died more
> >than twenty years before it was written?
>
> I don't need to, Paul. My knowledge of comedy and the workings of the human
> mind tell me it must be so.
So your knowledge does not actually extend to any
examples in the real world. What a surprise!
[..]
> Shakespeare, of course, did it with Monarcho, but you refuse to accept that.
Oxford knew Monarcho personally.
> And, no, I don't want to go through that debate again.
Understandably.
> I'm not sure Shakespeare was referring to the Cambridge Caius, but I just can't
> see why he could not have heard about him, thought him funny, and made a
> character somewhat based on him--and named him Caius to amuse his
> Campbridge friends.
Yes, hilarious. The guy was DEAD over 20 years
before your author thought to make a fool of him
on the public stage. By the mid-1590s his 'lawyer
friends' would have started to reminise fondly
about the man. They would have looked askance
at some peasant who was never near a university
making fun of the most generous of their college's
benefactors.
Paul.
Bob Grumman
>>in ordinary talk about drinking: Kit: "I used up my sizes for this term in two
>> days." Of course, he'd ONLY make such a remark to a fellow student or an
>> employee of Cambridge.
>
>That is not the use in Lear -- which was
>
> Lear to Regan: "'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
"scant" was a uniquely Cambridgian term at the time?
>This is a good example of the accurate idiomatic
>use of a phrase, where Stratfordians have to claim
>that 'it all came from books' (or something equally
>idiotic).
Right, like his hearing it from a Cambridge acquaintance and sponging it up the
way most verbally creative people sponge up new terms.
>It's similar to the argument over the use of legal terms.
>
>Leaning how to use such words and phrases
>accurately takes time. You _don't_ pick them
>up from books,
Some people do. You simply have no idea of the ability of many people with
accommodance, or the ability to absorb words and ideas, to take in new
information and make it their own because you clearly lack accommodance.
>nor from casual conversations
>in pubs with lawyers (nor from Cambridge men).
Yes, you do, if people go to trials a lot, as they did in Shakespeare's day and
legal terminology seeps into the lexicon like computer terms do today, or
Freudian and Jungian terms have in the recent past.
>The obvious simple explanation is that the poet
>spent time at the university (and in legal studies)
>where he extensively engaged in discussion
>using such terms.
>Of course Strats must desperately avoid all normal
>obvious explanations.
Your explanation IS reasonable--except that all we know about Shakespeare
suggests that it is wrong. That it is possible to posit another explanation
that may be slightly less reasonable but which does not contradict the facts of
the matter such as Shakespeare's name on title-pages, etc., makes it also
unnecessary.
>> >Can you give any examples of bitter mockery in
>> >a play (or in a similar work, such as a TV film)
>> >against some quite obscure figure (whom the
>> >playwright had never met) and who died more
>> >than twenty years before it was written?
>>
>> I don't need to, Paul. My knowledge of comedy and the workings of the human
>> mind tell me it must be so.
>
>So your knowledge does not actually extend to any
>examples in the real world. What a surprise!
That does not follow, wack. What follows is that I haven't memorized the
particulars of the many examples in the real world that I've been aware of.
>[..]
>> Shakespeare, of course, did it with Monarcho, but you refuse to accept that.
>
>Oxford knew Monarcho personally.
Right. And he knew Henry VI personally, too. And Puck.
>> And, no, I don't want to go through that debate again.
>
>Understandably.
>
>>I'm not sure Shakespeare was referring to the Cambridge Caius, but I just can't
>> see why he could not have heard about him, thought him funny, and made a
>> character somewhat based on him--and named him Caius to amuse his
>> Campbridge friends.
>
>Yes, hilarious. The guy was DEAD over 20 years
>before your author thought to make a fool of him
>on the public stage.
He did not think to make a fool of him. He decided to use the amusing things
about him to make people laugh.
>By the mid-1590s his 'lawyer
>friends' would have started to reminisce fondly
>about the man. They would have looked askance
>at some peasant who was never near a university
>making fun of the most generous of their college's
>benefactors.
>Paul
Right. That's one of the reasons they started the conspiracy to make it look
like Oxford wrote his works.
--Bob G.
Paul Crowley
> It's always been my feeling that if Shakespeare could be
> reincarnated today, he would be absolutely flabbergasted by the number
> of learned works that have been written about his plays - "This guy
> says I wrote this play to depict the existential dilemma of man!
> Hell, I was just trying to pay my bar bill at the Mermaid!"
This is the epitome of Stratfordian idiocy.
The great canon was written for money --
and for no other reason. Why? Well, Strats
can't conceive of any other possible reason.
What else could there be, for God's sake?
Literature has no purpose other than to
make money for the author. That's right?
In'it? The same applies to all art.
And, of course, there is no need for any
artist to have any conception of what he
or she is trying to do (other than make
money).
If there was no other reason for being anti-
Strat, then this sort of thing -- which is routine
Stratfordianism (and a necessary part of it) --
is more than enough.
Paul.
Greg Reynolds
A good reason to be Oxfordian would be to convince a jury you're insane.
Gary Kosinsky
<slkwuoiut...@slkjlskjoioue.com> wrote:
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message news:3ec2c7fd...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
>
>> It's always been my feeling that if Shakespeare could be
>> reincarnated today, he would be absolutely flabbergasted by the number
>> of learned works that have been written about his plays - "This guy
>> says I wrote this play to depict the existential dilemma of man!
>> Hell, I was just trying to pay my bar bill at the Mermaid!"
>
>This is the epitome of Stratfordian idiocy.
Really? I've always wanted to write an epitome!
>The great canon was written for money --
>and for no other reason.
Oh, okay. Maybe he didn't just write for the money. Maybe he
wanted to impress the ladies as well.
> Why? Well, Strats
>can't conceive of any other possible reason.
Actually, I think most of the thousands of books and articles
that Elizabeth mentioned in her post were actually written by
'Strats'. So, yes, many (most) Strats can indeed find profound
meanings in the works of Shakespeare. The question in my mind is how
many of these profound meanings were deliberately set there by
Shakespeare?
>What else could there be, for God's sake?
>Literature has no purpose other than to
>make money for the author. That's right?
>In'it? The same applies to all art.
I think making money by writing was very much on Shakespeare's
mind. And on Greene's mind. And on Nashe's mind. And on Marlowe's
mind. And on and on.....
Don't you?
>And, of course, there is no need for any
>artist to have any conception of what he
>or she is trying to do (other than make
>money).
This is the money question. Just how much was Shakespeare
deliberately trying to put into his plays, and how much is being read
into those plays by some very smart people?
>If there was no other reason for being anti-
>Strat, then this sort of thing -- which is routine
>Stratfordianism (and a necessary part of it) --
>is more than enough.
I am puzzled why some people have such a hard time with the
idea that a writer, or any other artist, might be concerned with
financial returns from his art. That an artist might want to make a
few bucks along with making his art gives me no trouble at all.
- Gary Kosinsky
Bob Grumman
>idea that a writer, or any other artist, might be concerned with
>financial returns from his art. That an artist might want to make a
>few bucks along with making his art gives me no trouble at all.
>
>- Gary Kosinsky
That, sir, is a proposition almost as ludicrous as the proposition that a man
could want to run a tin mine concession not for patriotic reasons but to . . .
I'm sorry, I can't go on.
--Bob G.
Paul Crowley
> Actually, I think most of the thousands of books and articles
> that Elizabeth mentioned in her post were actually written by
> 'Strats'.
Most are written by academics or students, and
are quite unreadable.
[..]
> I think making money by writing was very much on Shakespeare's
> mind. And on Greene's mind. And on Nashe's mind. And on Marlowe's
> mind. And on and on.....
>
> Don't you?
Yes, we all have to live. The economic dimension
_must_ be brought into every theory that claims
to explain aspects of human behaviour. It is here
(as everywhere) that Stratfordians so spectacularly
fail. His plays are clearly not aimed as a mass
market; they are not designed to put bums on
seats . . . and, (under the Stratfordian view of his
career) he would have been a hopeless failure in
commercial terms.
Why, for example, spend all that time writing
sonnets? There is no money in them. Most
Oxfordians (following the stupid Strat pattern) are
equally at a loss to explain the 'economic justification'
of the sonnets -- something which HAS to be
explained (or explained away). You will notice that
Baconians and Marlites rarely refer to the sonnets.
> >And, of course, there is no need for any
> >artist to have any conception of what he
> >or she is trying to do (other than make
> >money).
>
> This is the money question. Just how much was Shakespeare
> deliberately trying to put into his plays, and how much is being read
> into those plays by some very smart people?
Those 'very smart people' are 99.99% frauds.
Often they are slick and clever frauds (Donald
Foster is a good example). What they read in is
invariably whatever is currently fashionable in
contemporary 'thought'. There is a market for
that stuff in academic journals -- and they have
to churn it out to advance their careers. It has
no other meaning. No one ever reads the stuff.
> >If there was no other reason for being anti-
> >Strat, then this sort of thing -- which is routine
> >Stratfordianism (and a necessary part of it) --
> >is more than enough.
>
> I am puzzled why some people have such a hard time with the
> idea that a writer, or any other artist, might be concerned with
> financial returns from his art. That an artist might want to make a
> few bucks along with making his art gives me no trouble at all.
Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Shake-
speare all had to earn a living. But it is utterly
wrong to suggest that:
(a) money was their sole motivation,
(b) they made it from a mass market,
(c) they did not know what they were doing.
How come Strats are so ready to assert all
three propositions in respect of their man,
when they would never dream of saying that
sort of thing about any other great artist?
Isn't that enough to tell them that they have
slipped up somewhere along the line?
Paul.
Paul Crowley
> > Lear to Regan: "'Tis not in thee to scant my sizes."
>
> "scant" was a uniquely Cambridgian term at the time?
The use with 'scant' with 'sizes' would probably
not have occurred to anyone unless they had
heard it used in context several times.
> >This is a good example of the accurate idiomatic
> >use of a phrase, where Stratfordians have to claim
> >that 'it all came from books' (or something equally
> >idiotic).
>
> Right, like his hearing it from a Cambridge acquaintance and
> sponging it up the way most verbally creative people sponge
> up new terms.
That is possible -- but unlikely. The constant
Strat recourse to unlikely explanations gets
very tedious. Can you give a parallel example
of any other author CASUALLY using a roughly
similar expression? It's one thing to work up a
specialised area and use its specialised
vocabulary in respect of it. It's another to apply
that vocabulary outside of that field.
> >Leaning how to use such words and phrases
> >accurately takes time. You _don't_ pick them
> >up from books,
>
> Some people do. You simply have no idea of the ability of many people with
> accommodance, or the ability to absorb words and ideas, to take in new
> information and make it their own because you clearly lack accommodance.
Since you've had to resort to your own neologism
to try to express what you mean, we can be quite
confident that it is 100% nonsense.
> >nor from casual conversations
> >in pubs with lawyers (nor from Cambridge men).
>
> Yes, you do, if people go to trials a lot, as they did in Shakespeare's day
Nonsense. People see many more trials
today then they did then -- on TV and in films.
e.g. Judge Judy, or the O.J. Simpson trials,
or all the trial scenes in TV soaps. Their
knowledge of legal terms is as weak as ever.
> and
> legal terminology seeps into the lexicon like computer terms do today, or
> Freudian and Jungian terms have in the recent past.
Crap. Simply not true -- as any lawyer will
tell you.
[..]
> >Yes, hilarious. The guy was DEAD over 20 years
> >before your author thought to make a fool of him
> >on the public stage.
>
> He did not think to make a fool of him. He decided to use the amusing things
> about him to make people laugh.
Of course he makes him look foolish. The
personal attacks on him are quite 'unfair' and
would be taken amiss by those who were his
friends, colleagues or sympathetic students.
> >By the mid-1590s his 'lawyer
> >friends' would have started to reminisce fondly
> >about the man. They would have looked askance
> >at some peasant who was never near a university
> >making fun of the most generous of their college's
> >benefactors.
>
> Right. That's one of the reasons they started the conspiracy to make it look
> like Oxford wrote his works.
God knows what is going on in your brain here.
Paul.
Gary Kosinsky
<slkwuoiut...@slkjlskjoioue.com> wrote:
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message news:3ec44cbe...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
>
>> Actually, I think most of the thousands of books and articles
>> that Elizabeth mentioned in her post were actually written by
>> 'Strats'.
>
>Most are written by academics or students, and
>are quite unreadable.
The point is, most of those authors believe William
Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
indeed have something profound to say.
As to whether these works are readable or not, it's a matter
of taste. Personally I don't read them very often, but clearly someone
is, otherwise they wouldn't be published.
>[..]
>> I think making money by writing was very much on Shakespeare's
>> mind. And on Greene's mind. And on Nashe's mind. And on Marlowe's
>> mind. And on and on.....
>>
>> Don't you?
>
>Yes, we all have to live.
Exactly.
>The economic dimension
>_must_ be brought into every theory that claims
>to explain aspects of human behaviour.
True.
> It is here
>(as everywhere) that Stratfordians so spectacularly
>fail. His plays are clearly not aimed as a mass
>market; they are not designed to put bums on
>seats . . . and, (under the Stratfordian view of his
>career) he would have been a hopeless failure in
>commercial terms.
Upon what information do you base this claim? What evidence
do you have that indicates that Shakespeare's plays were commercial
failures in his own time?
>
>Why, for example, spend all that time writing
>sonnets? There is no money in them. Most
>Oxfordians (following the stupid Strat pattern) are
>equally at a loss to explain the 'economic justification'
>of the sonnets -- something which HAS to be
>explained (or explained away). You will notice that
>Baconians and Marlites rarely refer to the sonnets.
I don't think we should swing from one exteme to another. To
suggest that an artist has a financial interest in his art doesn't
mean that that is his **only** interest. As well, he might very well
indulge in an artistic work (such as the sonnets) for mainly artistic
reasons, with very little thought given to financial renumeration.
>> >And, of course, there is no need for any
>> >artist to have any conception of what he
>> >or she is trying to do (other than make
>> >money).
>>
>> This is the money question. Just how much was Shakespeare
>> deliberately trying to put into his plays, and how much is being read
>> into those plays by some very smart people?
>
>Those 'very smart people' are 99.99% frauds.
>Often they are slick and clever frauds (Donald
>Foster is a good example). What they read in is
>invariably whatever is currently fashionable in
>contemporary 'thought'. There is a market for
>that stuff in academic journals -- and they have
>to churn it out to advance their careers. It has
>no other meaning. No one ever reads the stuff.
Hmmmm....as I mentioned, I don't read the stuff very often.
And I gather from your remarks that you don't either. But I don't
think that entitles either one of us to conclude that **nobody** reads
the stuff.
>> >If there was no other reason for being anti-
>> >Strat, then this sort of thing -- which is routine
>> >Stratfordianism (and a necessary part of it) --
>> >is more than enough.
>>
>> I am puzzled why some people have such a hard time with the
>> idea that a writer, or any other artist, might be concerned with
>> financial returns from his art. That an artist might want to make a
>> few bucks along with making his art gives me no trouble at all.
>
>Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Shake-
>speare all had to earn a living. But it is utterly
>wrong to suggest that:
> (a) money was their sole motivation,
Okay, I don't think money was Shakespeare's sole motivation.
As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake. He enjoyed
writing, and he was one of those lucky people who could make a living
doing something he enjoyed.
> (b) they made it from a mass market,
I've always been under the impression that Shakespeare's plays
were written and performed for the mass Elizabethan market.
> (c) they did not know what they were doing.
>
>How come Strats are so ready to assert all
>three propositions in respect of their man,
>when they would never dream of saying that
>sort of thing about any other great artist?
>
>Isn't that enough to tell them that they have
>slipped up somewhere along the line?
I'm not following your argument, Paul. Earlier, you seem to
suggest that most of the books and articles that give a 'serious
analysis' to this or that profound aspect of Shakespeare's writings
are frauds. But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
author. Which is it?
- Gary Kosinsky
Elizabeth Weir
The records don't back up your theory, Grumman.
The Inns of Court revels account book show two entries
for Shakespeare but no record of payment for his plays.
So the playwright who "wrote for money" and who was
willing to sue for a shilling, and who would starve
the poor of Stratford to make an extra quid would refuse
to accept money for the plays he wrote for the Inns of
Court?
That's not very Shakespearean of him.
Bob Grumman
>> that Elizabeth mentioned in her post were actually written by
>> 'Strats'.
>
>Most are written by academics or students, and
>are quite unreadable.
Paul has read them all, so knows this.
>> I think making money by writing was very much on Shakespeare's
>> mind. And on Greene's mind. And on Nashe's mind. And on Marlowe's
>> mind. And on and on.....
>>
>> Don't you?
>
>Yes, we all have to live.
Wow. You never went that far before, Paul.
>The economic dimension
>_must_ be brought into every theory that claims
>to explain aspects of human behaviour. It is here
>(as everywhere) that Stratfordians so spectacularly
>fail. His plays are clearly not aimed as a mass
>market; they are not designed to put bums on
>seats . . . and, (under the Stratfordian view of his
>career) he would have been a hopeless failure in
>commercial terms.
>
>Why, for example, spend all that time writing sonnets? There is no money in
>them.
How do you know? (1) Maybe they were written to someone from whom patronage was
possible. (2) Maybe they were written to circulate the poet's name in hopes
someone would patronize him. (3) Maybe they were written as practice for the
larger, greater works the poet hoped to do--for money.
But we don't believe he wrote ONLY for money. There's no reason he couldn't
have written some plays for money just about only, and others mainly for
himself, and sonnets to amuse his friends.
>> >And, of course, there is no need for any
>> >artist to have any conception of what he
>> >or she is trying to do (other than make
>> >money).
I wish you'd stop saying that because some of us believe that Shakespeare no
more knew exactly what he was doing as an artist ALL THE TIME than any other
major artist, he HAD NO CONCEPTION OF WHAT HE WAS TRYING TO DO. But I know you
won't.
>> This is the money question. Just how much was Shakespeare
>> deliberately trying to put into his plays, and how much is being read
>> into those plays by some very smart people?
>
>Those 'very smart people' are 99.99% frauds.
>Often they are slick and clever frauds (Donald
>Foster is a good example).
And just where was Foster fraudulent rather than (possibly) mistaken?
>> I am puzzled why some people have such a hard time with the
>> idea that a writer, or any other artist, might be concerned with
>> financial returns from his art. That an artist might want to make a
>> few bucks along with making his art gives me no trouble at all.
>
>Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Shake-
>speare all had to earn a living. But it is utterly
>wrong to suggest that:
> (a) money was their sole motivation,
No one does.
> (b) they made it from a mass market,
Shakespeare, of course, did.
> (c) they did not know what they were doing.
No one says this.
>How come Strats are so ready to assert all
>three propositions in respect of their man,
>when they would never dream of saying that
>sort of thing about any other great artist?
>
>Isn't that enough to tell them that they have
>slipped up somewhere along the line?
>Paul.
If it were true, it would indicate that they were perhaps 12% as misguided as
you, Paul.
--Bob G.
bobgrumman
>>
>> "scant" was a uniquely Cambridgian term at the time?
>
>The use with 'scant' with 'sizes' would probably
>not have occurred to anyone unless they had
>heard it used in context several times.
I think "scant" was a common verb, and could have been connected to anything
appropriate, such as "sizes." I think a poet writing about characters like
Falstaff would have heard and known just about all current slang pertaining to
drinking. I think a word-wack like Shakespeare could easily have heard the word
"sizes" used the Cambridgian way just once, and remembered it permanently.
>> >This is a good example of the accurate idiomatic
>> >use of a phrase, where Stratfordians have to claim
>> >that 'it all came from books' (or something equally
>> >idiotic).
>>
>> Right, like his hearing it from a Cambridge acquaintance and
>> sponging it up the way most verbally creative people sponge
>> up new terms.
>
>That is possible -- but unlikely. The constant
>Strat recourse to unlikely explanations gets
>very tedious. Can you give a parallel example
>of any other author CASUALLY using a roughly
>similar expression?
No, Paul, because I do not list things like that.
>It's one thing to work up a
>specialised area and use its specialised
>vocabulary in respect of it. It's another to apply
>that vocabulary outside of that field.
It's standard for poets.
>> >Leaning how to use such words and phrases
>> >accurately takes time. You _don't_ pick them
>> >up from books,
>>
>> Some people do. You simply have no idea of the ability of many people with
>> accommodance, or the ability to absorb words and ideas, to take in new
>> information and make it their own because you clearly lack accommodance.
>
>Since you've had to resort to your own neologism
>to try to express what you mean, we can be quite
>confident that it is 100% nonsense.
I didn't HAVE to resort to my own term, as is obvious, I stuck it in to give it
exposure. And to give you an excuse to disregard a spot-on criticism of your
mentality. (I'm very considerate that way.)
>> >nor from casual conversations
>> >in pubs with lawyers (nor from Cambridge men).
>>
>> Yes, you do, if people go to trials a lot, as they did in Shakespeare's day
>
>Nonsense. People see many more trials
>today then they did then -- on TV and in films.
>e.g. Judge Judy, or the O.J. Simpson trials,
>or all the trial scenes in TV soaps. Their
>knowledge of legal terms is as weak as ever.
I wouldn't know since I'm not much of a legal buff. But I do know that people
that follow sports pick up an incredible amount of specialized terminology,
accurately. Such terminology is just as opaque to the uninitiated as legalese,
but often used automatically by writers.
>> and
>> legal terminology seeps into the lexicon like computer terms do today, or
>> Freudian and Jungian terms have in the recent past.
>
>Crap. Simply not true -- as any lawyer will tell you.
What do lawyers know about the evolution of language? But I'll just say that
any lawyer will say I'm right, to rise to the level of your argument.
>
>[..]
>> >Yes, hilarious. The guy was DEAD over 20 years
>> >before your author thought to make a fool of him
>> >on the public stage.
>>
>> He did not think to make a fool of him. He decided to use the amusing things
>> about him to make people laugh.
>
>Of course he makes him look foolish. The
>personal attacks on him are quite 'unfair' and
>would be taken amiss by those who were his
>friends, colleagues or sympathetic students.
Yes, but that was not the point; the point was to present a humorous character.
>> >By the mid-1590s his 'lawyer
>> >friends' would have started to reminisce fondly
>> >about the man. They would have looked askance
>> >at some peasant who was never near a university
>> >making fun of the most generous of their college's
>> >benefactors.
>>
>> Right. That's one of the reasons they started the conspiracy to make it look
>> like Oxford wrote his works.
>
>God knows what is going on in your brain here.
>Paul.
It's very simple. I'm claiming that people appalled at what a peasant like
Shakespeare was writing decided to get back at him from shifting credit for his
plays to Oxford. You can't disprove my theory.
--Bob G.
Bob Grumman
>for Shakespeare but no record of payment for his plays.
(1) How many records of the Inns of Court revels indicate a payment to a
playwright?
(2) Were those who performed the Shakespearean plays paid?
(3) Is it impossible for a person who writes, IN PART, for money to TWICE allow
a play of his to be performed gratis (especially as it might help to publicize
it)?
snip of ridiculous libels of Shakespeare that I haven't the energy to counter.
--Bob G.
Elizabeth Weir
> >The Inns of Court revels account book show two entries
> >for Shakespeare but no record of payment for his plays.
>
> (1) How many records of the Inns of Court revels indicate a payment to a
> playwright?
None, Bob. The Inns of Court had a rule that no professional
plays could be played at the Inns.
That rule didn't bend until after the English Civil War
when the Renaissance was over and the Inns couldn't
produce good playwrights anymore. Then the revels were
deregulated and privatized and the economy collapsed.
> (2) Were those who performed the Shakespearean plays paid?
Yes, but if you're hoping that the Stratford Shakspere
was listed as a player, give up hope. There were no names
of players ever listed, only companies. The Master of the
Revels gave the players a lump sum--usually the whole L5--for
performances and costumes and whatever. Scenery was borrowed.
We have a letter from Francis Bacon to an aristocratic relative
asking to borrow horse and armour for some Gray's Inn revel.
[Grumman is experiencing a chill of fear].
> (3) Is it impossible for a person who writes, IN PART, for money to TWICE allow
> a play of his to be performed gratis (especially as it might help to publicize
> it)?
The Inn of Courts rule that no professional playwrights
could be hired covers that contingency, Grumman.
The Inns of Court were the finishing schools for the
student playwights mostly from Cambridge. There was
very serious revels competition between the Inns.
Gray's Inn, the largest Inn, and the one with most of the
Cambridge MA's nearly always won because they had, well,
Shakespeare, and also because Cambridge was famous for
its student Latin plays. If future scholars look very
carefully at Cambridge they will find that a very
young Will Shakespeare did his acting and playwriting
apprenticeship there.
The whole point, Grumman, was to create an opportunity
for the readers at Gray's Inn to practice amateur playwriting.
That's why professional playwrights were banned unless they
were also members of the Inns and that covered only two names
in the revels accounts--Bacon and Chapman.
> snip of ridiculous libels of Shakespeare that I haven't the energy to counter.
>
> --Bob G.
What, this?
Paul Crowley
> >Strat recourse to unlikely explanations gets
> >very tedious. Can you give a parallel example
> >of any other author CASUALLY using a roughly
> >similar expression?
>
> No, Paul, because I do not list things like that.
>
> >It's one thing to work up a
> >specialised area and use its specialised
> >vocabulary in respect of it. It's another to apply
> >that vocabulary outside of that field.
>
> It's standard for poets.
If it's standard for poets then you should be able
to provide examples -- even if you "don't list things
like that".
[..]
> >Nonsense. People see many more trials
> >today then they did then -- on TV and in films.
> >e.g. Judge Judy, or the O.J. Simpson trials,
> >or all the trial scenes in TV soaps. Their
> >knowledge of legal terms is as weak as ever.
>
> I wouldn't know since I'm not much of a legal buff. But I do know that people
> that follow sports pick up an incredible amount of specialized terminology,
> accurately. Such terminology is just as opaque to the uninitiated as legalese,
> but often used automatically by writers.
That's a good analogy, because we all know
games with which we have only a vague
acquaintance. My knowledge of terms used in
baseball and American football comes only from
their application to everyday uses, even if I've
often seen the games played (e.g.in cinema and
TV films). I just have no interest in them, so I
don't make the effort to learn the meanings of the
terms -- or if I do, I quickly forget them. That's
exactly the same for everyone else. A surprising
number of people in France got interested in
soccer in 1998 when the World Cup was being
played in that country, and they leaned the
meanings of (some) soccer terms. But then
most forgot them. Shakespeare would have
been no different from that general pattern. He
learnt various terms, codes and languages, and
he used them in his plays. End of story. So we
know he had a great interest in law, falconry,
music, Italy and so on . . and that he attended
Cambridge.
You can invent crap about him having a special
gift that enabled him to remember and use terms
from books or the like. The argument is no
different from the standard Strat story of 'the magic
pen'. Any theory you need is pulled down from
the sky, as if it was all magic.
I suppose that's how it has to be for you. Stone-
age peoples have no other way of explaining
things they don't understand, such as airplanes,
TV, or other aspects of modern technology
Likewise, you can only conceive of the wonderful
faculties of the Stratman as manifestations of
magical powers.
Paul.
Paul Crowley
> The point is, most of those authors believe William
> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
> indeed have something profound to say.
That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
-- or are engaged in some career move where
earning money is the game plan.
> >The economic dimension
> >_must_ be brought into every theory that claims
> >to explain aspects of human behaviour.
>
> True.
>
> > It is here
> >(as everywhere) that Stratfordians so spectacularly
> >fail. His plays are clearly not aimed as a mass
> >market; they are not designed to put bums on
> >seats . . . and, (under the Stratfordian view of his
> >career) he would have been a hopeless failure in
> >commercial terms.
>
> Upon what information do you base this claim?
Read the first speech of 30 or more lines in
any of the canonical plays -- post it here and
show how it would appeal to groundlings.
> What evidence
> do you have that indicates that Shakespeare's plays
> were commercial failures in his own time?
How can I prove an absence? There is almost
no evidence to show that they were commercial
successes.
> >Why, for example, spend all that time writing
> >sonnets? There is no money in them. Most
> >Oxfordians (following the stupid Strat pattern) are
> >equally at a loss to explain the 'economic justification'
> >of the sonnets -- something which HAS to be
> >explained (or explained away). You will notice that
> >Baconians and Marlites rarely refer to the sonnets.
>
> I don't think we should swing from one exteme to another. To
> suggest that an artist has a financial interest in his art doesn't
> mean that that is his **only** interest. As well, he might very well
> indulge in an artistic work (such as the sonnets) for mainly artistic
> reasons, with very little thought given to financial renumeration.
An artist _might_. But you are clearly not aware
of the enormity of the effort that the poet put into
most of the sonnets. They are incredibly dense
complex enterprises. Your argument is rather
like saying that Michelangelo might have painted
the roof of the Sistine Chapel for free. It would be
nonsensical. You cannot exclude the financial
aspect as though it did not exist. The man had
to live. He could not have put in that much work
without recompense.
> >> >And, of course, there is no need for any
> >> >artist to have any conception of what he
> >> >or she is trying to do (other than make
> >> >money).
> >>
> >> This is the money question. Just how much was Shakespeare
> >> deliberately trying to put into his plays, and how much is being read
> >> into those plays by some very smart people?
> >
> >Those 'very smart people' are 99.99% frauds.
> >Often they are slick and clever frauds (Donald
> >Foster is a good example). What they read in is
> >invariably whatever is currently fashionable in
> >contemporary 'thought'. There is a market for
> >that stuff in academic journals -- and they have
> >to churn it out to advance their careers. It has
> >no other meaning. No one ever reads the stuff.
>
> Hmmmm....as I mentioned, I don't read the stuff very often.
> And I gather from your remarks that you don't either. But I don't
> think that entitles either one of us to conclude that **nobody** reads
> the stuff.
If it had any value or meaning wouldn't it be
referred to from time to time? When did you
last see a reference in this NG to a paper in a
learned journal? Amid the tens of thousands
that are published every year, only a tiny number
are readable, or are ever quoted.
> >Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Shake-
> >speare all had to earn a living. But it is utterly
> >wrong to suggest that:
> > (a) money was their sole motivation,
>
> Okay, I don't think money was Shakespeare's sole motivation.
Gosh, that's big of you!
> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
artists?
> He enjoyed
> writing, and he was one of those lucky people who could make a living
> doing something he enjoyed.
>
> > (b) they made it from a mass market,
>
> I've always been under the impression that Shakespeare's plays
> were written and performed for the mass Elizabethan market.
You are completely wrong. Next time you
see or read a play, ask yourself how it
would go down with an average illiterate
Elizabethan Joe.
> > (c) they did not know what they were doing.
> >
> >How come Strats are so ready to assert all
> >three propositions in respect of their man,
> >when they would never dream of saying that
> >sort of thing about any other great artist?
> >
> >Isn't that enough to tell them that they have
> >slipped up somewhere along the line?
>
> I'm not following your argument, Paul. Earlier, you seem to
> suggest that most of the books and articles that give a 'serious
> analysis' to this or that profound aspect of Shakespeare's writings
> are frauds.
I suggested no such thing. Strat academics
ARE frauds. They pretend to present 'profound'
analyses etc., -- but it is all (or virtually all) empty
meaningless verbiage.
> But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
> profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
> author. Which is it?
The author knew exactly what he was
doing -- in the same way as Michelangelo,
and Da Vinci did, and as all other great
artists necessarily do.
Paul.
Bob Grumman
>> >for Shakespeare but no record of payment for his plays.
>>
>> (1) How many records of the Inns of Court revels indicate a payment to a
>> playwright?
>
>None, Bob. The Inns of Court had a rule that no professional
>plays could be played at the Inns.
Your evidence for this? I would also like to know if the plays by Shakespeare
were the only plays performed at the Inns that also were performed at public
theatres.
>That rule didn't bend until after the English Civil War
>when the Renaissance was over and the Inns couldn't
>produce good playwrights anymore. Then the revels were
>deregulated and privatized and the economy collapsed.
>
>> (2) Were those who performed the Shakespearean plays paid?
>Yes, but if you're hoping that the Stratford Shakspere
>was listed as a player, give up hope.
No, I assumed that his company put on the plays and was rewarded for them, and
that he therefore benefitted financially from their performance, the same way he
benefitted financially from the production of all his plays.
>We have a letter from Francis Bacon to an aristocratic relative
>asking to borrow horse and armour for some Gray's Inn revel.
>[Grumman is experiencing a chill of fear].
Not really. In fact, I've been reading a book called FRANCIS BACON, PHILOSOPHER
OF INDUSTRIAL SCIENCE, by Benjamin Farrington, which pretty convincingly shows
how unlikely it was that Bacon wrote any plays. For instance, he is documented
as having written ADDRESSES for the Revels at Gray's Inn in 1594, and they seem
to have been explicitly philosophical, one of them sketching his eideas for
improving the realm such as setting up libraries and museums. Odd that nowhere
in the Shakespearean plays does a ruler discuss this sort of thing (that I know
of). Bacon writes about it all the time. Odd, too, that Bacon can be recorded
as writing orations but not plays for the Inns.
>>(3) Is it impossible for a person who writes, IN PART, for money to TWICE allow
>>a play of his to be performed gratis (especially as it might help to publicize
>> it)?
>
>The Inn of Courts rule that no professional playwrights
>could be hired covers that contingency, Grumman.
So you say, but you rarely get your facts right. I think what happened was that
Shakespeare did not write for the Inns; rather, his company was asked to perform
plays for the Inns, and performed his. Also, whoever wrote the Shakespearean
plays, he had written material that appeared on the public stage.
>The Inns of Court were the finishing schools for the
>student playwights mostly from Cambridge. There was
>very serious revels competition between the Inns.
>
>Gray's Inn, the largest Inn, and the one with most of the
>Cambridge MA's nearly always won because they had, well,
>Shakespeare, and also because Cambridge was famous for
>its student Latin plays. If future scholars look very
>carefully at Cambridge they will find that a very
>young Will Shakespeare did his acting and playwriting
>apprenticeship there.
Not likely, since there is no factual evidence suggesting that he did.
>The whole point, Grumman, was to create an opportunity
>for the readers at Gray's Inn to practice amateur playwriting.
No, the point was to have entertainments. Something Farrington gives little
hint that Bacon cared about.
>That's why professional playwrights were banned unless they
>were also members of the Inns and that covered only two names
>in the revels accounts--Bacon and Chapman.
>
>>snip of ridiculous libels of Shakespeare that I haven't the energy to counter.
>>
>> --Bob G.
>
>What, this?
>
> So the playwright who "wrote for money" and who was
> willing to sue for a shilling, and who would starve
> the poor of Stratford to make an extra quid would refuse
> to accept money for the plays he wrote for the Inns of
> Court?
>
> That's not very Shakespearean of him.
That's right, moron.
--Bob G.
Gary Kosinsky
<slkwuoiut...@slkjlskjoioue.com> wrote:
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message news:3ec53946...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
>
>> The point is, most of those authors believe William
>> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
>> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
>> indeed have something profound to say.
>
>That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
>papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
>they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
>-- or are engaged in some career move where
>earning money is the game plan.
I figure most of these people are quite sincere in their
writings and findings. They may have accompanying motives for
publishing, whether it be money, reputation, or just the kick of
having their name in print. And I think Shakespeare had similiar
mixed motives in writing his works.
>> >The economic dimension
>> >_must_ be brought into every theory that claims
>> >to explain aspects of human behaviour.
>>
>> True.
>>
>> > It is here
>> >(as everywhere) that Stratfordians so spectacularly
>> >fail. His plays are clearly not aimed as a mass
>> >market; they are not designed to put bums on
>> >seats . . . and, (under the Stratfordian view of his
>> >career) he would have been a hopeless failure in
>> >commercial terms.
>>
>> Upon what information do you base this claim?
>
>Read the first speech of 30 or more lines in
>any of the canonical plays -- post it here and
>show how it would appeal to groundlings.
Are we agreed that the playhouses were quite popular with all
sorts of people in the Elizabethan age? If so, and if you don't
believe that Shakespeare's plays were popular amongst the general
population, then whose plays do you think were popular?
>
>> What evidence
>> do you have that indicates that Shakespeare's plays
>> were commercial failures in his own time?
>
>How can I prove an absence? There is almost
>no evidence to show that they were commercial
>successes.
On the face of it, this is an interesting point. I'm
certainly not aware of any attendance figures for Shakespeare's plays.
Yet we have Francis Mere's testimony that Shakespeare was regarded as
the best playwright for comedy and drama. Clearly he was popular with
some people.
>
>> >Why, for example, spend all that time writing
>> >sonnets? There is no money in them. Most
>> >Oxfordians (following the stupid Strat pattern) are
>> >equally at a loss to explain the 'economic justification'
>> >of the sonnets -- something which HAS to be
>> >explained (or explained away). You will notice that
>> >Baconians and Marlites rarely refer to the sonnets.
>>
>> I don't think we should swing from one exteme to another. To
>> suggest that an artist has a financial interest in his art doesn't
>> mean that that is his **only** interest. As well, he might very well
>> indulge in an artistic work (such as the sonnets) for mainly artistic
>> reasons, with very little thought given to financial renumeration.
>
>An artist _might_. But you are clearly not aware
>of the enormity of the effort that the poet put into
>most of the sonnets. They are incredibly dense
>complex enterprises. Your argument is rather
>like saying that Michelangelo might have painted
>the roof of the Sistine Chapel for free. It would be
>nonsensical. You cannot exclude the financial
>aspect as though it did not exist. The man had
>to live. He could not have put in that much work
>without recompense.
Okay. But aren't you the one who squawks every time someone
brings up the idea that Shakespeare might have had a financial
interest in his work? I'm getting confused here.
Hmmmm...perhaps that says more about this newsgroup than it
says about the various papers or learned journals?
>> >Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Shake-
>> >speare all had to earn a living. But it is utterly
>> >wrong to suggest that:
>> > (a) money was their sole motivation,
>>
>> Okay, I don't think money was Shakespeare's sole motivation.
>
>Gosh, that's big of you!
>
>> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
>> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
>
>Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
>Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
>artists?
Fair enough. Shakespeare had a strong artistic interest in
his works. He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
>
>> He enjoyed
>> writing, and he was one of those lucky people who could make a living
>> doing something he enjoyed.
>>
>> > (b) they made it from a mass market,
>>
>> I've always been under the impression that Shakespeare's plays
>> were written and performed for the mass Elizabethan market.
>
>You are completely wrong. Next time you
>see or read a play, ask yourself how it
>would go down with an average illiterate
>Elizabethan Joe.
Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
>
>> > (c) they did not know what they were doing.
>> >
>> >How come Strats are so ready to assert all
>> >three propositions in respect of their man,
>> >when they would never dream of saying that
>> >sort of thing about any other great artist?
>> >
>> >Isn't that enough to tell them that they have
>> >slipped up somewhere along the line?
>>
>> I'm not following your argument, Paul. Earlier, you seem to
>> suggest that most of the books and articles that give a 'serious
>> analysis' to this or that profound aspect of Shakespeare's writings
>> are frauds.
>
>I suggested no such thing. Strat academics
>ARE frauds. They pretend to present 'profound'
>analyses etc., -- but it is all (or virtually all) empty
>meaningless verbiage.
>
>> But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
>> profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
>> author. Which is it?
>
>The author knew exactly what he was
>doing -- in the same way as Michelangelo,
>and Da Vinci did, and as all other great
>artists necessarily do.
I'm not sure if we're any further ahead than when we started.
Elizabeth Weir initially seemed to suggest (I think) that given the
number of learned essays, articles and books written by some highly
educated people about the works, the works themselves must have been
written by some equally highly educated person. (If that was not
Elizabeth's point, I apologize.) I questioned this premise,
suggesting that much of the profundity being found in the plays was in
fact being read into the plays by some smart people. I questioned
whether Shakespeare deliberately placed these profound theories in the
plays. You seem to agree. At least, earlier above you point out that
"Anyone can write 'scholarly' papers on navel-scratching or
nose-picking...", which suggests that you agree that Shakespeare's
works do not necessarily contain the profundity that some find in
them. So what is your point?
- Gary Kosinsky
Bob Grumman
>
>"bobgrumman" <bobgrumm...@newsguy.com> wrote in message
>news:ba3k6...@drn.newsguy.com...
>
>> >Strat recourse to unlikely explanations gets
>> >very tedious. Can you give a parallel example
>> >of any other author CASUALLY using a roughly
>> >similar expression?
>>
>> No, Paul, because I do not list things like that.
>>
>> >It's one thing to work up a
>> >specialised area and use its specialised
>> >vocabulary in respect of it. It's another to apply
>> >that vocabulary outside of that field.
>>
>> It's standard for poets.
>
>If it's standard for poets then you should be able
>to provide examples -- even if you "don't list things
>like that".
>[..]
Many things are standard for poets that I don't have lists of to consult.
I merely say he had a large number of interests, and the ability to remember
terminology. Some magic.
>I suppose that's how it has to be for you. Stone-
>age peoples have no other way of explaining
>things they don't understand, such as airplanes,
>TV, or other aspects of modern technology
>Likewise, you can only conceive of the wonderful
>faculties of the Stratman as manifestations of
>magical powers.
>Paul.
What in the world is magical about getting interested in a subject and reading
about it, and talking about it with friends, enough to pick up its jargon? I
feel I've done it with many subjects--aside from the ones I studied (belatedly)
in college. Why couldn't Shakespeare have done the same?
And that's it for me, once again, on this subject. The only way properly to
consider it is to get a list of all the passages in Shakespeare that indicate to
wacks that Shakespeare had dome kind of specialized knowledge that the man from
Stratford could not have had, and analyze it. When you do that, you find things
like a line or two about how blue Italian skies are, something no one who hadn't
been to Italy (according to Ogburn) could have known about.
--Bob G.
Bob Grumman
>
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message
>news:3ec53946...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
>
>> The point is, most of those authors believe William
>> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
>> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
>> indeed have something profound to say.
>
>That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
>papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
>they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
>-- or are engaged in some career move where
>earning money is the game plan.
Oh, sure, ALL "Strats" are doing this. You really have to be insane to believe
that. It is true that I hope to make money eventually with a book about the
authorship question, but what evidence do you have that Gary, for instance, is
going anywhere with it except to increased personal knowledge/clarity about
Shakespeare? Or that John W. Kennedy is not entirely concerned with defeating
what he takes to be lies, with NO financial motive? Not that a person's motives
for writing something have anything to do with its truth or falsehood.
--Bob G.
David Tame
"Elizabeth Weir" <elizabe...@mail.com> wrote in message
news:efbc3534.03051...@posting.google.com...
>
> We have a letter from Francis Bacon to an aristocratic relative
> asking to borrow horse and armour for some Gray's Inn revel.
Perhaps he was just trying to help out? :-)
Even though, not being paid for the plays, he was in need of money, and was
actually willing to go to the lengths of borrowing.... You would have
thought that others might have chipped in to help as well. Why, if Bacon had
nothing to do with the plays, was he paying to put them on, going into debt
to do so?
He was even briefly apprehended for debt - one of the "black marks" on his
name. What isn't always known imo is where he was continually putting his
funds, and not getting recompense in like manner for his efforts.
> The Inns of Court were the finishing schools for the
> student playwights mostly from Cambridge.
If future scholars look very
> carefully at Cambridge they will find that a very
> young Will Shakespeare did his acting and playwriting
> apprenticeship there.
Possible to say how carefully one must look, and where?
David T
Elizabeth Weir
> "Elizabeth Weir" <elizabe...@mail.com> wrote in message
> news:efbc3534.03051...@posting.google.com...
>
> >
> > We have a letter from Francis Bacon to an aristocratic relative
> > asking to borrow horse and armour for some Gray's Inn revel.
>
> Perhaps he was just trying to help out? :-)
Not according to the Gesta Grayorum. Bacon was involved in
the theatricals at Gray's Inn, acting and writing.
> Even though, not being paid for the plays, he was in need of money, and was
> actually willing to go to the lengths of borrowing.... You would have
> thought that others might have chipped in to help as well. Why, if Bacon had
> nothing to do with the plays, was he paying to put them on, going into debt
> to do so?
Bacon's imprisonment for debt in 1693 is a story that
begins with his republican speech in Parliament the same
year that changed the course of constitutional history
by transferring the power of the purse from the Crown
to Parliament.
Elizabeth was not a republican and punished Bacon
by cutting of his money while at the same time commanding
him to stay at Court. She eventually gave him a salary
but entailed it until 1609. Bacon was by no means
the only victim of Elizabeth's favorite maxium about
"starving unruly horses."
> He was even briefly apprehended for debt - one of the "black marks" on his
> name.
He got a play out of it when his loving brother Antonio,
I mean Anthony, rushed home from Italy--probably Venice
since the "New Babylon" was the center of Catholic-Protestant
espionage and Anthony was a spy--to sell one of his estates
to bail Francis out of prison where he had been put by a
"hard Jew."
> What isn't always known imo is where he was continually putting his
> funds, and not getting recompense in like manner for his efforts.
The Baconians have documented evidence that Bacon was in the
publishing business from the time he was given an entire building
next to his quarters at Gray's Inn. Bacon later had a scriptorium
at Twickensham--no wonder his play scripts were not blotted.
> > The Inns of Court were the finishing schools for the
> > student playwights mostly from Cambridge.
> If future scholars look very
> > carefully at Cambridge they will find that a very
> > young Will Shakespeare did his acting and playwriting
> > apprenticeship there.
>
> Possible to say how carefully one must look, and where?
I'll be posting some new evidence on that point.
lyra
> Bob Grumman wrote in message news:<ba3lm...@drn.newsguy.com>...
> > >The Inns of Court revels account book show two entries
> > >for Shakespeare but no record of payment for his plays.
> >
> > (1) How many records of the Inns of Court revels indicate a payment to a
> > playwright?
>
> None, Bob. The Inns of Court had a rule that no professional
> plays could be played at the Inns.
<snip>
> The Inns of Court were the finishing schools for the
> student playwights mostly from Cambridge. There was
> very serious revels competition between the Inns.
"playwights"... I like this new word!...
it could be useful...
> Gray's Inn, the largest Inn, and the one with most of the
> Cambridge MA's nearly always won because they had, well,
> Shakespeare, and also because Cambridge was famous for
> its student Latin plays.
If future scholars look very
> carefully at Cambridge they will find that a very
> young Will Shakespeare did his acting and playwriting
> apprenticeship there.
I wish they would look very carefully
at Cambridge for the Christopher Marlowe
handwritten document which is likely to be there!
or is it just dreams!...
* * * * * *
Gary Kosinsky
wrote:
>In article <s2hxa.13679$pK2....@news.indigo.ie>, "Paul says...
>>
>>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message
>>news:3ec53946...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
>>
>>> The point is, most of those authors believe William
>>> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
>>> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
>>> indeed have something profound to say.
>>
>>That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
>>papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
>>they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
>>-- or are engaged in some career move where
>>earning money is the game plan.
>
>Oh, sure, ALL "Strats" are doing this. You really have to be insane to believe
>that. It is true that I hope to make money eventually with a book about the
>authorship question, but what evidence do you have that Gary, for instance, is
>going anywhere with it except to increased personal knowledge/clarity about
>Shakespeare?
Ahhh, Bob, you do realize I'll be running for the vacant seat
on the Stratford Trust's 'Morals and Manners' sub-committee (Canadian
chapter), don't you? And that these posts are simply to get my name
out in the public? Granted, $250,000 U.S. per year may not be much to
a free-lance poet like yourself, but it's a lot to me!
- Gary Kosinsky
Gary Kosinsky
Weir) wrote:
SNIP
>Bacon's imprisonment for debt in 1693 is a story that
>begins with his republican speech in Parliament the same
>year that changed the course of constitutional history
>by transferring the power of the purse from the Crown
>to Parliament.
Did Bacon's speech really initiate the transfer of the power
of the purse from the Crown to Parliament? I thought his speech
mainly defended the already established authority of the Commons in
these money matters (admittedly a ballsy move in itself).
>>He was even briefly apprehended for debt - one of the "black marks" on his
>>name.
>He got a play out of it when his loving brother Antonio,
>I mean Anthony, rushed home from Italy--probably Venice
>since the "New Babylon" was the center of Catholic-Protestant
>espionage and Anthony was a spy--to sell one of his estates
>to bail Francis out of prison where he had been put by a
>"hard Jew."
How long was Bacon in prison? I thought it was only for a
day.
- Gary Kosinsky
David Tame
> publishing business from the time he was given an entire building
> next to his quarters at Gray's Inn. Bacon later had a scriptorium
> at Twickensham--no wonder his play scripts were not blotted.
You know how one may read, study, and at one time know this and that, but
not all is retained and recalled? I'm aware of Bacon writing of his "idle
pens" at Twickenham, but right now no longer recall any other fairly clear
indication that there was a scriptorium working for him. Of course, I may
have just known and later forgot. In fact I know at one time I knew more on
this. So what else is there indicating a scriptorium beside the "idle pens"?
(I wrote just a couple of days back of the idle pens in another post, as
below.)
David T
----------------------
"I have here an idle pen or two.... I pray send me somewhat else for them to
write out.... From my Lodge at Twickenham Park,
Your entire Loving Brother,
Francis Bacon", in a letter dated January 25, 1594, he wrote to Anthony
Bacon.
The "idle pens" are referred to here also as "them", who would work
consequetively to "write out". They were Bacon's i.e. he was the head or
core of these "pens". If Bacon himself found one of his "pens" had finished
a project, he did not of course have to write a letter to himself about
finding them the next thing to do. Why, in the letter above, he was saying
this to his brother is unclear (to me) except for the fact that it obviously
includes Anthony within the network.
Bob Grumman
>on the Stratford Trust's 'Morals and Manners' sub-committee (Canadian
>chapter), don't you? And that these posts are simply to get my name
>out in the public? Granted, $250,000 U.S. per year may not be much to
>a free-lance poet like yourself, but it's a lot to me!
>- Gary Kosinsky
Nuts. And I had such a high opinion of you, Gary. I guess I can now ignore
your opinions.
--Bob G.
Paul Crowley
> >> The point is, most of those authors believe William
> >> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
> >> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
> >> indeed have something profound to say.
> >
> >That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
> >papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
> >they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
> >-- or are engaged in some career move where
> >earning money is the game plan.
>
> I figure most of these people are quite sincere in their
> writings and findings.
'Sincere'? The word has no application here.
Would you apply it to the army of academics
and officials in the Soviet Union producing vast
libraries of Marxist-Leninist books and journals
on every topic you can imagine (and on many
more that you can't) . .?
> They may have accompanying motives for
> publishing, whether it be money, reputation, or just the kick of
> having their name in print. And I think Shakespeare had similiar
> mixed motives in writing his works.
Shakespeare works should not be compared
with those vast libraries of meaningless
Marxist-Leninist junk. And the vast libraries
of Stratfordian junk written on his works have
about the same value . . and about the same
relevance to the works
> >Read the first speech of 30 or more lines in
> >any of the canonical plays -- post it here and
> >show how it would appeal to groundlings.
>
> Are we agreed that the playhouses were quite popular with all
> sorts of people in the Elizabethan age?
Yes. And they competed with the bear pits.
> If so, and if you don't
> believe that Shakespeare's plays were popular amongst the general
> population, then whose plays do you think were popular?
Maybe you can some guidance on this from
the records of Henslowe and Alleyn (which
are remarkably free of references to Shake-
speare). But do you know the names of the
writers of popular TV shows?
> >How can I prove an absence? There is almost
> >no evidence to show that they were commercial
> >successes.
>
> On the face of it, this is an interesting point. I'm
> certainly not aware of any attendance figures for Shakespeare's plays.
> Yet we have Francis Mere's testimony that Shakespeare was regarded as
> the best playwright for comedy and drama. Clearly he was popular with
> some people.
He certainly became a success with the
critics; we can take Meres as the first of them.
That does not mean that he made money, nor
even that his plays were performed on the
public stage -- other than a few and those
rarely.
> >> I don't think we should swing from one exteme to another. To
> >> suggest that an artist has a financial interest in his art doesn't
> >> mean that that is his **only** interest. As well, he might very well
> >> indulge in an artistic work (such as the sonnets) for mainly artistic
> >> reasons, with very little thought given to financial renumeration.
> >
> >An artist _might_. But you are clearly not aware
> >of the enormity of the effort that the poet put into
> >most of the sonnets. They are incredibly dense
> >complex enterprises. Your argument is rather
> >like saying that Michelangelo might have painted
> >the roof of the Sistine Chapel for free. It would be
> >nonsensical. You cannot exclude the financial
> >aspect as though it did not exist. The man had
> >to live. He could not have put in that much work
> >without recompense.
>
> Okay. But aren't you the one who squawks every time someone
> brings up the idea that Shakespeare might have had a financial
> interest in his work? I'm getting confused here.
I squawk at Strats who speak of Shakespeare
in terms they would never dream of using
when referring to other great artists.
> >> Hmmmm....as I mentioned, I don't read the stuff very often.
> >> And I gather from your remarks that you don't either. But I don't
> >> think that entitles either one of us to conclude that **nobody** reads
> >> the stuff.
> >
> >If it had any value or meaning wouldn't it be
> >referred to from time to time? When did you
> >last see a reference in this NG to a paper in a
> >learned journal? Amid the tens of thousands
> >that are published every year, only a tiny number
> >are readable, or are ever quoted.
>
> Hmmmm...perhaps that says more about this newsgroup than it
> says about the various papers or learned journals?
Nope. No one refers to those papers --
ever. They are unreadable junk.
> >> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
> >> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
> >
> >Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
> >Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
> >artists?
>
> Fair enough. Shakespeare had a strong artistic interest in
> his works.
That's a ridiculous thing to say. You would
never say that sort of thing about Michelangelo.
The art goes to the core of the work. It has no
sense without it.
> He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
That is necessarily the case. Like other
great artists, he devoted his life to his work.
Your 'IMO' is stupid; you would never say
the same about Michelangelo.
> >You are completely wrong. Next time you
> >see or read a play, ask yourself how it
> >would go down with an average illiterate
> >Elizabethan Joe.
>
> Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
Try to justify your argument. Pick the first 30+
line speech from any play and show how it was
written to please them.
> >> But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
> >> profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
> >> author. Which is it?
> >
> >The author knew exactly what he was
> >doing -- in the same way as Michelangelo,
> >and Da Vinci did, and as all other great
> >artists necessarily do.
>
> I'm not sure if we're any further ahead than when we started.
> Elizabeth Weir initially seemed to suggest (I think) that given the
> number of learned essays, articles and books written by some highly
> educated people about the works, the works themselves must have been
> written by some equally highly educated person. (If that was not
> Elizabeth's point, I apologize.) I questioned this premise,
> suggesting that much of the profundity being found in the plays was in
> fact being read into the plays by some smart people. I questioned
> whether Shakespeare deliberately placed these profound theories in the
> plays. You seem to agree. At least, earlier above you point out that
Shakespeare did, of course, deliberately put
profound issues into the plays. We all know
that. What the academic twats write has no
bearing on anything -- whatever Elizabeth Weir
or anyone might say.
> "Anyone can write 'scholarly' papers on navel-scratching or
> nose-picking...", which suggests that you agree that Shakespeare's
> works do not necessarily contain the profundity that some find in
> them.
The academic twats might as well be writing on
nose-picking as on Shakespeare -- for all that
they understand of him. (Haven't you ever seen
any of that garbage? Sign up to the SHAKSPER
list to get a broad sense.)
Shakespeare is great -- and has long been
recognised as such. But Strats have got him
utterly wrong. In a largely separate development
hideous academe evolved, and part of it devotes
its time to 'analysis' of its conception of Shake-
speare. So we get enormous piles of crap.
Given the nature of academe, even IF it had
Shakespeare right, it would still produce a lot
of crap. But getting him wrong results in much
greater quantities of crap -- greater by several
orders of magnitude.
Paul.
Paul Crowley
> In article <s2hxa.13679$pK2....@news.indigo.ie>, "Paul says...
> >
> >"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message
> >news:3ec53946...@News.CIS.DFN.DE...
> >
> >> The point is, most of those authors believe William
> >> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
> >> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
> >> indeed have something profound to say.
> >
> >That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
> >papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
> >they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
> >-- or are engaged in some career move where
> >earning money is the game plan.
>
> Oh, sure, ALL "Strats" are doing this.
Oh dear, here we go again. Rigidniks simply
can't read words in context. You have to explain
every damn thing to them, eliminating any
remotely possible ambiguity -- because you
can be sure that if any is present, they will
probably read it that way -- since they have no
basis whatever in ordinary common sense..
Most 'Strats' (in the sense you took it) don't
read the plays or go to the theatre. They last
looked at Shakespeare in school -- in so
far as they looked at him at all. Obviously
none of them are in it for money.
I was writing of 'Strats' as those academics
who write books and 'learned' papers.
> You really have to be insane to believe
> that. It is true that I hope to make money eventually with a book about the
> authorship question, but what evidence do you have that Gary, for instance, is
> going anywhere with it except to increased personal knowledge/clarity about
> Shakespeare? Or that John W. Kennedy is not entirely concerned with defeating
> what he takes to be lies, with NO financial motive? Not that a person's motives
> for writing something have anything to do with its truth or falsehood.
Paul.
David Tame
>
> "Elizabeth Weir" <elizabe...@mail.com> wrote in message
> news:efbc3534.03051...@posting.google.com...
> > The Baconians have documented evidence that Bacon was in the
> > publishing business from the time he was given an entire building
> > next to his quarters at Gray's Inn. Bacon later had a scriptorium
> > at Twickensham--no wonder his play scripts were not blotted.
>
> You know how one may read, study, and at one time know this and that, but
> not all is retained and recalled? I'm aware of Bacon writing of his "idle
> pens" at Twickenham, but right now no longer recall any other fairly clear
> indication that there was a scriptorium working for him. Of course, I may
> have just known and later forgot. In fact I know at one time I knew more
on
> this. So what else is there indicating a scriptorium beside the "idle
pens"?
> David T
If you had time, I'd be interested still, Elizabeth, if you had more in mind
that the below in writing of a scriptorium. Nevertheless...
Thinking about it, without even looking deeply, the following are examples
of how his contemporaries - even the great writers of the day - looked up to
him, it seems. And these are just a few of the indications that he was
considered the centre of a "choir" of authors...
Ben Jonson, in Ode for Lord Bacon's Birthday (1621) , publ. in Underwood,
No.51, wrote:
Hail, happy Genius of this ancient pile!
How comes it all things so about thee smile?
The fire, the wine, the men! and in the midst,
Thou stand'st as if some Mystery thou did'st!
Here we have Bacon "in the midst" as a "Genius" - this even written of him
by none less than Jonson - and......."as if some Mystery thou did'st!" Say
no more, squire.
John Williams, in Manes Verulamiani (1626), Elegy 12, upon Bacon's death,
wrote:
"Is it thus falls the rarest glory of the Aonian band? and do we decree to
entrust seed to the Aonian fields? Break pens, tear up writings, if the dire
goddesses may justly act so. Alas! what a tongue is mute! what eloquence
ceases! Whither have departed the nectar and ambrosia of your genius? How is
it happened to us, the disciples of the Muses, that Apollo, the leader of
our choir, should die?"
Nowadays he is known for his philosophical writings. But what is this that
he was the leader of disciples of the Muses, the "Apollo" and leader of the
others, the "choir"? Why, according to conventional wisdom, would Bacon have
been considered the leader of such disciples of the Muses? Would not
Shakespeare have been considered so? Who else but the author of the Works
would have been considered such a figure?
In the same document, in another elegy upon Bacon's death, an anonymous
writer also says: "Ah, the tenth Muse and glory of the choir has perished.
Ah, never before has Apollo himself been truly unhappy!" Again, Bacon as the
tenth Muse - and glory of the choir. A philosoher and statesman alone would
hardly be considered so. Surely these are words befitting only the author of
the Works? (There's also the reference, again, to the "tenth Muse", a
reference in those times to Pallas Athena, the Spear Shaker.)
Interested in continuing Elizabeth's thought that B had a "scriptorium", I'm
restricting myself only to references that come to mind wherein Bacon is
considered a form of leader or chief of other writers - even writers of the
stature of Ben Jonson, his friend. I'm omitting here all other references,
numerous as they are, to B as a concealed poet. And will close with one
further quote from Jonson. Jonson knew both Shakespeare and Bacon. Did he
write *thusly* and so overwhelmingly of the man of Stratford? Never. Hear
the heart of the song within these words, wherein we also seem to catch a
glimpse of disciples listening around him, around the table, in wrapt
attention upon his every word:
"Yet there happened in my time one noble speaker who was full of gravity in
his speaking; his language, where he could spare or pass by a jest, was
nobly censorious. No man ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more
weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No
member of his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not
cough or look aside from him without loss. He commanded where he spoke, and
had his judges angry or pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections
more in his power. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should
make an end.
"But the learned and able (though unfortunate) successor [Bacon] is he who
hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our tongue which may be
compared or preferred either to insolent Greece, or haughty Rome. In short,
within his view, and about his times, were all the wits born that could
honour a language, or help study. Now things daily fall: wits grow downward,
and Eloquence grows backward. So that he may be named and stand as the mark
and acme of our language.
"My conceit of his Person was never increased toward him by his place or
honours. But I have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only
proper to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the
greatest men and most worthy of admiration that had been in many ages. In
his adversity I ever prayed that God would give him strength: for greatness
he could not want. Neither could I condole in a word or syllable for him, as
knowing no accident could do harm to virtue, but rather help to make it
manifest."
Ben Jonson, Discoveries (1641), p 102.
So that was Jonson, writing of one who he considered "the mark and acme of
our language." Who else could be such other than "Shakespeare"?
Realistically, surely Jonson should have written, that Bacon was "second
only to Will Shakespeare" or some such. But of S not a mention.
In support of the concept of "one amid a choir", a leader, we also read
above from Jonson that "within his view, and about his times, were all the
wits born that could honour a language, or help study". Not necessarily
accurately, for great writing continued, but at the thought of Bacon's
demise (not Shaksper's), Jonson writes: "Now things daily fall: wits grow
downward, and Eloquence grows backward." - meaning, without a doubt, after
Bacon.
Such things can be viewed variously, through variously tinted spectacles of
one's own character and inclination, of course. But I fancy here that I read
the words of a disciple in memory of a Master.
David T
Gary Kosinsky
<slkwuoiut...@slkjlskjoioue.com> wrote:
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote in message
>
>> >> The point is, most of those authors believe William
>> >> Shakespeare of Stratford wrote the works. So there are many 'Strats'
>> >> who don't believe that Shakespeare wrote only for money, but did
>> >> indeed have something profound to say.
>> >
>> >That does not follow. Anyone can write 'scholarly'
>> >papers on navel-scratching or nose-picking -- IF
>> >they get paid to do so. All Strats are being paid
>> >-- or are engaged in some career move where
>> >earning money is the game plan.
>>
>> I figure most of these people are quite sincere in their
>> writings and findings.
>
>'Sincere'? The word has no application here.
>Would you apply it to the army of academics
>and officials in the Soviet Union producing vast
>libraries of Marxist-Leninist books and journals
>on every topic you can imagine (and on many
>more that you can't) . .?
'Sincere', in the sense that they honestly believed in what
they are writing? Yes, I think that some of those academics and
officials actually believed their own theories.
>> They may have accompanying motives for
>> publishing, whether it be money, reputation, or just the kick of
>> having their name in print. And I think Shakespeare had similiar
>> mixed motives in writing his works.
>
>Shakespeare works should not be compared
>with those vast libraries of meaningless
>Marxist-Leninist junk.
Since no-one, and certainly not me, has compared Shakespeare's
works to Marxist-Leninist libraries, I'm uncertain why you're saying
this, but I'll agree anyways. Nor should Shakespeare's works be
compared to a bag of week old potatoes.
>And the vast libraries
>of Stratfordian junk written on his works have
>about the same value . . and about the same
>relevance to the works
I wonder what the Marxist-Leninist line on Shakespeare was?
They must have had an opinion.
>> >Read the first speech of 30 or more lines in
>> >any of the canonical plays -- post it here and
>> >show how it would appeal to groundlings.
>>
>> Are we agreed that the playhouses were quite popular with all
>> sorts of people in the Elizabethan age?
>
>Yes. And they competed with the bear pits.
>
>> If so, and if you don't
>> believe that Shakespeare's plays were popular amongst the general
>> population, then whose plays do you think were popular?
>
>Maybe you can some guidance on this from
>the records of Henslowe and Alleyn (which
>are remarkably free of references to Shake-
>speare).
As I recall, Shakespeare didn't write for Henslowe during the
time covered by the records we have. Or something like that.
>But do you know the names of the
>writers of popular TV shows?
No. What does this have to do with anything we're discussing
here?
>> >How can I prove an absence? There is almost
>> >no evidence to show that they were commercial
>> >successes.
>>
>> On the face of it, this is an interesting point. I'm
>> certainly not aware of any attendance figures for Shakespeare's plays.
>> Yet we have Francis Mere's testimony that Shakespeare was regarded as
>> the best playwright for comedy and drama. Clearly he was popular with
>> some people.
>
>He certainly became a success with the
>critics; we can take Meres as the first of them.
>That does not mean that he made money, nor
>even that his plays were performed on the
>public stage -- other than a few and those
>rarely.
As I said, this is an interesting point. But then how can we
establish that **any** Elizabethan playwright made money, or that his
plays were performed on the public stage, given the scarcity of
records from the time? You know, Paul, if you're going to raise
questions like this, we're going to have to get someone who knows what
they're talking about into this discussion. And then where will we
be?
>
>> >> I don't think we should swing from one exteme to another. To
>> >> suggest that an artist has a financial interest in his art doesn't
>> >> mean that that is his **only** interest. As well, he might very well
>> >> indulge in an artistic work (such as the sonnets) for mainly artistic
>> >> reasons, with very little thought given to financial renumeration.
>> >
>> >An artist _might_. But you are clearly not aware
>> >of the enormity of the effort that the poet put into
>> >most of the sonnets. They are incredibly dense
>> >complex enterprises. Your argument is rather
>> >like saying that Michelangelo might have painted
>> >the roof of the Sistine Chapel for free. It would be
>> >nonsensical. You cannot exclude the financial
>> >aspect as though it did not exist. The man had
>> >to live. He could not have put in that much work
>> >without recompense.
>>
>> Okay. But aren't you the one who squawks every time someone
>> brings up the idea that Shakespeare might have had a financial
>> interest in his work? I'm getting confused here.
>
>I squawk at Strats who speak of Shakespeare
>in terms they would never dream of using
>when referring to other great artists.
What terms are those?
>> >> Hmmmm....as I mentioned, I don't read the stuff very often.
>> >> And I gather from your remarks that you don't either. But I don't
>> >> think that entitles either one of us to conclude that **nobody** reads
>> >> the stuff.
>> >
>> >If it had any value or meaning wouldn't it be
>> >referred to from time to time? When did you
>> >last see a reference in this NG to a paper in a
>> >learned journal? Amid the tens of thousands
>> >that are published every year, only a tiny number
>> >are readable, or are ever quoted.
>>
>> Hmmmm...perhaps that says more about this newsgroup than it
>> says about the various papers or learned journals?
>
>Nope. No one refers to those papers --
>ever. They are unreadable junk.
Classic Crowley. Paul, you may not read those papers. I may
not read those papers (and I admit that I've seen more than a few
books and articles that I considered pretentious nonsense). But does
that mean that **no one** reads those papers? Does it ever occur to
you that your disinterest in those papers and journals is more of a
reflection of your own intellectual limitations (and mine, for that
matter) than that they are "unreadable junk"?
>
>> >> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
>> >> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
>> >
>> >Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
>> >Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
>> >artists?
>>
>> Fair enough. Shakespeare had a strong artistic interest in
>> his works.
>
>That's a ridiculous thing to say. You would
>never say that sort of thing about Michelangelo.
>The art goes to the core of the work. It has no
>sense without it.
Sure I would. Michelangelo had a strong artistic interest in
his works. There!
>> He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
>
>That is necessarily the case. Like other
>great artists, he devoted his life to his work.
>Your 'IMO' is stupid; you would never say
>the same about Michelangelo.
Michelangelo had a strong financial interest in his works,
IMO. Easy.
>> >You are completely wrong. Next time you
>> >see or read a play, ask yourself how it
>> >would go down with an average illiterate
>> >Elizabethan Joe.
>>
>> Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
>
>Try to justify your argument. Pick the first 30+
>line speech from any play and show how it was
>written to please them.
Give me the first 30+ line speech from a play that you think
did please them, and let's see how it compares to Shakespeare's plays.
>
>> >> But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
>> >> profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
>> >> author. Which is it?
>> >
>> >The author knew exactly what he was
>> >doing -- in the same way as Michelangelo,
>> >and Da Vinci did, and as all other great
>> >artists necessarily do.
>>
>> I'm not sure if we're any further ahead than when we started.
>> Elizabeth Weir initially seemed to suggest (I think) that given the
>> number of learned essays, articles and books written by some highly
>> educated people about the works, the works themselves must have been
>> written by some equally highly educated person. (If that was not
>> Elizabeth's point, I apologize.) I questioned this premise,
>> suggesting that much of the profundity being found in the plays was in
>> fact being read into the plays by some smart people. I questioned
>> whether Shakespeare deliberately placed these profound theories in the
>> plays. You seem to agree. At least, earlier above you point out that
>
>Shakespeare did, of course, deliberately put
>profound issues into the plays. We all know
>that. What the academic twats write has no
>bearing on anything -- whatever Elizabeth Weir
>or anyone might say.
This is the crux of the original post. Just how much did
Shakespeare put into his works, and how much is simply being read into
the plays by clever people? I'm of the opinion that too much is being
read into the plays. But perhaps I'm wrong, and perhaps I'm seriously
underestimating Shakespeare and his intentions.
>> "Anyone can write 'scholarly' papers on navel-scratching or
>> nose-picking...", which suggests that you agree that Shakespeare's
>> works do not necessarily contain the profundity that some find in
>> them.
>
>The academic twats might as well be writing on
>nose-picking as on Shakespeare -- for all that
>they understand of him. (Haven't you ever seen
>any of that garbage? Sign up to the SHAKSPER
>list to get a broad sense.)
>
>Shakespeare is great -- and has long been
>recognised as such. But Strats have got him
>utterly wrong. In a largely separate development
>hideous academe evolved, and part of it devotes
>its time to 'analysis' of its conception of Shake-
>speare. So we get enormous piles of crap.
>Given the nature of academe, even IF it had
>Shakespeare right, it would still produce a lot
>of crap. But getting him wrong results in much
>greater quantities of crap -- greater by several
>orders of magnitude.
Yet again with the scatology.
- Gary Kosinsky
Bob Grumman
>So that was Jonson, writing of one who he considered "the mark and acme of
>our language." Who else could be such other than "Shakespeare"?
>Realistically, surely Jonson should have written, that Bacon was "second
>only to Will Shakespeare" or some such.
Why? Shakespeare was only a playwright. Bacon was a . . . Philosopher.
--Bob G.
Bob Grumman
>in terms they would never dream of using
>when referring to other great artists.
Right, I would never dream of saying Dickens had any interest in making money,
or that Poe or Twain did, or Shaw or Stoppard or Defoe or Jonson. Or Keats. Or
Balzac. Or Fielding. Or Picasso. Or Mozart.
>> Hmmmm...perhaps that says more about this newsgroup than it
>> says about the various papers or learned journals?
>
>Nope. No one refers to those papers --
>ever.
Not true. Downs refers to them occasionally, and I've read a few. Price
referred to them quite a bit. Elizabeth seems to refer to them quite a bit,
too, though it's hard to tell if she is referring to real papers.
> They are unreadable junk.
Why should anyone take the opinion of you seriously on this matter, Paul? What
literary works or works of literary criticism have you shown an ability to
discuss illuminatingly--other than, in your own mind, Shakespeare's?
>> >> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
>> >> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
>> >
>> >Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
>> >Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
>> >artists?
>>
>> Fair enough. Shakespeare had a strong artistic interest in
>> his works.
>
>That's a ridiculous thing to say. You would
>never say that sort of thing about Michelangelo.
>The art goes to the core of the work. It has no
>sense without it.
>
>> He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
>
>That is necessarily the case. Like other
>great artists, he devoted his life to his work.
>Your 'IMO' is stupid; you would never say
>the same about Michelangelo.
>
>> >You are completely wrong. Next time you
>> >see or read a play, ask yourself how it
>> >would go down with an average illiterate
>> >Elizabethan Joe.
>>
>> Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
>
>Try to justify your argument. Pick the first 30+
>line speech from any play and show how it was
>written to please them.
How about you picking one, Paul, and showing why it would NOT have appealed to
the average PLAY-GOER of the time (who cares about the average illiterate
Elizabethan Joe).
>> >> But here you seem to be suggesting that there is some
>> >> profound meaning in the works, intentionally placed there by the
>> >> author. Which is it?
>> >
>> >The author knew exactly what he was
>> >doing -- in the same way as Michelangelo,
>> >and Da Vinci did, and as all other great
>> >artists necessarily do.
NO great artist knows exactly what he's doing--because all great artists explore
as much as they consolidate what they already know.
>> I'm not sure if we're any further ahead than when we started.
>> Elizabeth Weir initially seemed to suggest (I think) that given the
>> number of learned essays, articles and books written by some highly
>> educated people about the works, the works themselves must have been
>> written by some equally highly educated person. (If that was not
>> Elizabeth's point, I apologize.) I questioned this premise,
>> suggesting that much of the profundity being found in the plays was in
>> fact being read into the plays by some smart people. I questioned
>> whether Shakespeare deliberately placed these profound theories in the
>> plays. You seem to agree. At least, earlier above you point out that
>
>Shakespeare did, of course, deliberately put
>profound issues into the plays. We all know
>that. What the academic twats write has no
>bearing on anything -- whatever Elizabeth Weir
>or anyone might say.
He put profound poetry into his plays but not profound thought.
>> "Anyone can write 'scholarly' papers on navel-scratching or
>> nose-picking...", which suggests that you agree that Shakespeare's
>> works do not necessarily contain the profundity that some find in
>> them.
>
>The academic twats might as well be writing on
>nose-picking as on Shakespeare -- for all that
>they understand of him. (Haven't you ever seen
>any of that garbage? Sign up to the SHAKSPER
>list to get a broad sense.)
>
>Shakespeare is great -- and has long been
>recognised as such. But Strats have got him
>utterly wrong. In a largely separate development
>hideous academe evolved, and part of it devotes
>its time to 'analysis' of its conception of Shake-
>speare. So we get enormous piles of crap.
>Given the nature of academe, even IF it had
>Shakespeare right, it would still produce a lot
>of crap. But getting him wrong results in much
>greater quantities of crap -- greater by several
>orders of magnitude.
>
>Paul.
I can't wait to see the book you must have nearly finished that supports this
claim. (Note: at least these "twats" manage to do more than pop off in
newsgroups--they finish whole books!)
--Bob G.
>
David Tame
>
> "Elizabeth Weir" <elizabe...@mail.com> wrote in message
> news:efbc3534.03051...@posting.google.com...
> > The Baconians have documented evidence that Bacon was in the
> > publishing business from the time he was given an entire building
> > next to his quarters at Gray's Inn. Bacon later had a scriptorium
> > at Twickensham--no wonder his play scripts were not blotted.
>
> You know how one may read, study, and at one time know this and that, but
> not all is retained and recalled? I'm aware of Bacon writing of his "idle
> pens" at Twickenham, but right now no longer recall any other fairly clear
> indication that there was a scriptorium working for him.
Ah! Alice Chambers Bunten in "Francis Bacon and Twickenham Park" wrote of
it. "This was a small gathering of students who wrote under Bacon's guidance
various Essays or Miscellanies for the distribution of knowledge as well as
the taking down of his revisions ... works which were constantly being added
to or improved." (More follows.) But I don't have the book and don't know of
her source material.
David T
Paul Crowley
> >> >All Strats are being paid
> >> >-- or are engaged in some career move where
> >> >earning money is the game plan.
> >>
> >> I figure most of these people are quite sincere in their
> >> writings and findings.
> >
> >'Sincere'? The word has no application here.
> >Would you apply it to the army of academics
> >and officials in the Soviet Union producing vast
> >libraries of Marxist-Leninist books and journals
> >on every topic you can imagine (and on many
> >more that you can't) . .?
>
> 'Sincere', in the sense that they honestly believed in what
> they are writing? Yes, I think that some of those academics and
> officials actually believed their own theories.
Sure. But would the 'sincere' ones have produced
work that was any better than that from those who
were entirely cynical in their approach? The same
applies to Stratfordian work on Shakespeare. It is
not possible to say anything remotely honest and
sensible within such a 'discipline'. That is crystal
clear even from the nature of the output. It's junk,
junk, junk and more junk. No one can pretend
otherwise. It's like Radio Moscow at any time
between 1950 and 1989. No one with a brain
takes it seriously.
> >> Are we agreed that the playhouses were quite popular with all
> >> sorts of people in the Elizabethan age?
[,,]
> >But do you know the names of the
> >writers of popular TV shows?
>
> No. What does this have to do with anything we're discussing
> here?
I am saying that the 'plays' in the popular theatre
of the day was at about the same level as the bulk
of TV output -- quite unmemorable.
> >He certainly became a success with the
> >critics; we can take Meres as the first of them.
> >That does not mean that he made money, nor
> >even that his plays were performed on the
> >public stage -- other than a few and those
> >rarely.
>
> As I said, this is an interesting point. But then how can we
> establish that **any** Elizabethan playwright made money, or that his
> plays were performed on the public stage, given the scarcity of
> records from the time?
We know that theatres existed, and roughly
how much was spent on them. We know
that a lot of people (such as Alleyn) made
good money from them. However none of
that tells us how often Shakespeare's plays
were performed in public.
[..]
> Classic Crowley. Paul, you may not read those papers. I may
> not read those papers (and I admit that I've seen more than a few
> books and articles that I considered pretentious nonsense). But does
> that mean that **no one** reads those papers? Does it ever occur to
> you that your disinterest in those papers and journals is more of a
> reflection of your own intellectual limitations (and mine, for that
> matter) than that they are "unreadable junk"?
I don't think that It's hard to distinguish.
People who have something to say usually
write clearly. Those guys are incapable of
doing so. It's not as though there are difficult
scientific concepts in the field, which you can
only learn with a lot of work.
> >> >> As I said, he may also have been trying to impress the ladies. And
> >> >> perhaps he was also indulging in art for art's sake.
> >> >
> >> >Only 'perhaps'? Do you say the same about
> >> >Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and all other great
> >> >artists?
> >>
> >> Fair enough. Shakespeare had a strong artistic interest in
> >> his works.
> >
> >That's a ridiculous thing to say. You would
> >never say that sort of thing about Michelangelo.
> >The art goes to the core of the work. It has no
> >sense without it.
>
> Sure I would. Michelangelo had a strong artistic interest in
> his works. There!
Yes -- and doesn't it look stupid? No one
with an interest in art would ever say it --
and certainly not to a friend who shared that
interest. So how come it seems reasonable
to say the same about Shakespeare?
Do I have to tell you?
Your conception of Shakespeare is totally
screwed up . . . which goes with being a Strat.
> >> He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
> >
> >That is necessarily the case. Like other
> >great artists, he devoted his life to his work.
> >Your 'IMO' is stupid; you would never say
> >the same about Michelangelo.
>
> Michelangelo had a strong financial interest in his works,
> IMO. Easy.
Yes -- and doesn't it look stupid -- in much
the same way? No person with an interest
in art would ever say it. So how come it
seems reasonable to say the same about
Shakespeare? Do I have to tell you?
Your conception of Shakespeare is totally
screwed up. That goes with being a Strat.
> >> >You are completely wrong. Next time you
> >> >see or read a play, ask yourself how it
> >> >would go down with an average illiterate
> >> >Elizabethan Joe.
> >>
> >> Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
> >
> >Try to justify your argument. Pick the first 30+
> >line speech from any play and show how it was
> >written to please them.
>
> Give me the first 30+ line speech from a play that you think
> did please them, and let's see how it compares to Shakespeare's plays.
They did not go for speeches of 30+ lines
at all -- for the same reason you don't see
characters in modern TV soaps speaking
30+ lines (let alone in blank verse).
> >Shakespeare did, of course, deliberately put
> >profound issues into the plays. We all know
> >that. What the academic twats write has no
> >bearing on anything -- whatever Elizabeth Weir
> >or anyone might say.
>
> This is the crux of the original post. Just how much did
> Shakespeare put into his works
An enormous amount. We can sense that,
even if we sometimes find it hard to articulate.
> and how much is simply being read into
> the plays by clever people?
If they are Strats then what they 'read in', or
claim to read in, is necessarily mistaken
and/or empty pomposity.
> I'm of the opinion that too much is being
> read into the plays.
You are right when you see Strats reading
stuff into the plays. Nearly everything they
read in must necessarily be nonsense.
Paul.
Bob Grumman
>We know that theatres existed, and roughly
>how much was spent on them. We know
>that a lot of people (such as Alleyn) made
>good money from them. However none of
>that tells us how often Shakespeare's plays
>were performed in public.
Here, from memory alone, are a few things that DO, for me, tell us that
Shakespeare's plays were performed on the public stage, and made money.
(1) Greene expressed jealosy of Shakespeare the playwright, and Greene was a
professional writer of plays for the public stage.
(2) Some of the title-pages of published plays indicate that they were performed
on the public stage.
(3) That they were published suggests they were being performed, and were
well-received.
(4) They were performed by the Chamberlain's/King's Men, a company of players
who performed a great deal on the public stage; if these men had the plays of
Shakespeare in their possession, why would they not have performed them on the
public stage?
(5) We have the testimony of play-goers of the day who attended Shakespearean
plays--e.g., those who were at the Globe during the Henry VIII performance that
caused the Globe to burn down.
(6) Nash wrote somewhere about the popularity of a Henry VI play by Shakespeare.
(7) Shakespeare's company was at least twice recorded as being asked to perform
a play, and their answers indicate that they considered the plays they performed
as a result just plays in the repertory--i.e., plays to be performed for the
public.
(8) We have no records of any Shakespearean play that was privately performed.
(9) The Parnassus plays mention Shakespeare as a play-writing rival of Ben
Jonson's, and Jonson wrote for the public stage.
I'm sure there is better evidence that Shakespeare wrote for the public stage
than the above. I hope someone with more time than I have can correct and add
to my list.
We say things like that only because you wacks say we claim Shakespeare was only
interested in money. We take it for granted that among Shakespeare's many
reasons for writing was a desire to fashion fine works of art.
>Your conception of Shakespeare is totally
>screwed up . . . which goes with being a Strat.
No, your conception is, your conception is!!! Which goes with being insane.
And not having the slightest idea what it's like being a playwright, a poet, or
an artist of any kind.
>> >> He also had a strong financial interest in his works, IMO.
>> >
>> >That is necessarily the case. Like other
>> >great artists, he devoted his life to his work.
>> >Your 'IMO' is stupid; you would never say
>> >the same about Michelangelo.
>>
>> Michelangelo had a strong financial interest in his works,
>> IMO. Easy.
>
>Yes -- and doesn't it look stupid -- in much
>the same way? No person with an interest
>in art would ever say it.
I say it all the time. I hope eventually to make money one way or another from
my writings. When asked what Rosencrantz and Guildensterm was about, Stoppard
said (if I have the story right), "It's about to make me a lot of money!"
>So how come it
>seems reasonable to say the same about
>Shakespeare? Do I have to tell you?
One says strange things at time because of the need to answer imbeciles.
>Your conception of Shakespeare is totally
>screwed up. That goes with being a Strat.
Oh, nuts. I was able to answer that the first time, but you got me this time,
Paul.
Snip
--Bob G.
Gary Kosinsky
On Mon, 19 May 2003 00:27:57 +0100, "Paul Crowley" wrote:
>"Gary Kosinsky" <gk...@vcn.bc.ca> wrote:
>> >> Are we agreed that the playhouses were quite popular with all
>> >> sorts of people in the Elizabethan age?
>[,,]
>> >But do you know the names of the
>> >writers of popular TV shows?
>>
>> No. What does this have to do with anything we're discussing
>> here?
>
>I am saying that the 'plays' in the popular theatre
>of the day was at about the same level as the bulk
>of TV output -- quite unmemorable.
Okay, I'm inclined to agree (without really knowing all that
much about it) that a lot of drek may have been produced for the
Elizabethan stage that appealed to the lowest common denominater
amongst the audience.
I'm still not sure what your point is. In fact, I've lost
track of what this thread is all about.
>> >He certainly became a success with the
>> >critics; we can take Meres as the first of them.
>> >That does not mean that he made money, nor
>> >even that his plays were performed on the
>> >public stage -- other than a few and those
>> >rarely.
>>
>> As I said, this is an interesting point. But then how can we
>> establish that **any** Elizabethan playwright made money, or that his
>> plays were performed on the public stage, given the scarcity of
>> records from the time?
>
>We know that theatres existed,
>and roughly how much was spent on them.
> We know
>that a lot of people (such as Alleyn) made
>good money from them. However none of
>that tells us how often Shakespeare's plays
>were performed in public.
We don't have detailed records telling us how often
Shakespeare's plays were performed in public. Agreed. (However, as
was mentioned earlier, we know that he attracted the attention of
several critics who acclaimed his work, and that his plays were chosen
to be presented at Court during the Christmas season. And, of course,
his co-workers saw fit to preserve his work in the First Folio.)
>[..]
>> Classic Crowley. Paul, you may not read those papers. I may
>> not read those papers (and I admit that I've seen more than a few
>> books and articles that I considered pretentious nonsense). But does
>> that mean that **no one** reads those papers? Does it ever occur to
>> you that your disinterest in those papers and journals is more of a
>> reflection of your own intellectual limitations (and mine, for that
>> matter) than that they are "unreadable junk"?
>
>I don't think that It's hard to distinguish.
>People who have something to say usually
>write clearly. Those guys are incapable of
>doing so. It's not as though there are difficult
>scientific concepts in the field, which you can
>only learn with a lot of work.
I'm the wrong person to be discussing this. I suspect an
English Lit grad may have something to say about this.
No, because the answer is quite obvious. While there is some
disagreement over who wrote the works of Shakespeare, there is no
comparable debate (I don't think) over who created the works of
Michelangelo. If there were such a debate, then we would have to
state the obvious about Michelangelo, as we do about Shakespeare in
our discussions in this newsgroup.
>Your conception of Shakespeare is totally
>screwed up. That goes with being a Strat.
>
>
>> >> >You are completely wrong. Next time you
>> >> >see or read a play, ask yourself how it
>> >> >would go down with an average illiterate
>> >> >Elizabethan Joe.
>> >>
>> >> Okay - I see them loving it. Now what?
>> >
>> >Try to justify your argument. Pick the first 30+
>> >line speech from any play and show how it was
>> >written to please them.
>>
>> Give me the first 30+ line speech from a play that you think
>> did please them, and let's see how it compares to Shakespeare's plays.
>
>They did not go for speeches of 30+ lines
>at all -- for the same reason you don't see
>characters in modern TV soaps speaking
>30+ lines (let alone in blank verse).
That's an interesting, albeit unsubstantiated, point, Paul.
It is possible that the aforementioned drek that was produced for the
lowest common denominator went by the waysides shortly after it was
produced. Thus we have no record of it. The limited number of plays
we do have from the Elizabethan age represent the cream of the crop,
the ones people saw fit to preserve through publishing.
But I'm still not sure where you're going with this.
- Gary Kosinsky
Nicholas Whyte
>
> I say it all the time. I hope eventually to make money one way or another from
> my writings. When asked what Rosencrantz and Guildensterm was about, Stoppard
> said (if I have the story right), "It's about to make me a lot of money!"
Similarly, Don MacLean, the writer of the song "American Pie", when
asked what it meant, replied, "It means I'll never have to work
again!"
Nicholas
my real email address is explorers at whyte dot com
Paul Crowley
> >how much was spent on them. We know
> >that a lot of people (such as Alleyn) made
> >good money from them. However none of
> >that tells us how often Shakespeare's plays
> >were performed in public.
>
> Here, from memory alone, are a few things that DO, for me, tell us that
> Shakespeare's plays were performed on the public stage, and made money.
>
> (1) Greene expressed jealosy of Shakespeare the playwright, and Greene was a
> professional writer of plays for the public stage.
Only a dyed-in-the-wool Strat would quote that
as 'evidence' -- and then they have to distort
their anatomy into hideous shapes to get it out.
> (2) Some of the title-pages of published plays indicate that they were performed
> on the public stage.
Actually, it would be interesting to do a complete
analysis of what it says on pages of all the
published plays we have -- to see if the statements
on those of WS are any different. I wonder if
anyone has done it? References to 'performances
before Her Majesty' would certainly be more
common.
> (3) That they were published suggests they were being performed, and were
> well-received.
Nope. It suggests that some people at the
time were capable of appreciating their value
(what a surprise!) and didn't want to see
them lost for ever.
> (4) They were performed by the Chamberlain's/King's Men, a
> company of players who performed a great deal on the public stage;
They were the principal players for the court.
> if these men had the plays of Shakespeare in their possession,
> why would they not have performed them on the public stage?
They probably did -- to small audiences and
over short runs.
> (5) We have the testimony of play-goers of the day who attended Shakespearean
> plays--e.g., those who were at the Globe during the Henry VIII performance that
> caused the Globe to burn down.
The records are so fragmentary and
haphazard that no firm conclusion can be
drawn from them.
> (6) Nash wrote somewhere about the popularity of a Henry VI play by Shakespeare.
>
> (7) Shakespeare's company was at least twice recorded
> as being asked to perform a play, and their answers
> indicate that they considered the plays they performed
> as a result just plays in the repertory--
*Richard II* in 1601 is one instance. What's the other?
> i.e., plays to be performed for the public.
Nope. They made good money from court and
private performances.
> (8) We have no records of any Shakespearean play that was privately performed.
What are you talking about? 38 separate performances
(or sequences of performances) are known -- 7 at the
Globe, 2 at the Rose, 2 at the Inns of Court, 2 at sea,
23 at court and 2 at unknown locations. So 9 out of
38 are public.
> I'm sure there is better evidence that Shakespeare
> wrote for the public stage than the above.
Nope. There isn't.
Paul.
Paul Crowley
> with snippage
[..]
> I'm still not sure what your point is. In fact, I've lost
> track of what this thread is all about.
This sub-thread started with me 'squawking'
at some expression by you of Stratfordian
nonsense (i.e Stratfordian orthodoxy).
And it's still on that. You originally wrote:
> > > > It's always been my feeling that if Shakespeare could be
> > > > reincarnated today, he would be absolutely flabbergasted by the number
> > > > of learned works that have been written about his plays - "This guy
> > > > says I wrote this play to depict the existential dilemma of man!
> > > > Hell, I was just trying to pay my bar bill at the Mermaid!"
[..]
> >> >That's a ridiculous thing to say. You would
> >> >never say that sort of thing about Michelangelo.
> >> >The art goes to the core of the work. It has no
> >> >sense without it.
> >>
> >> Sure I would. Michelangelo had a strong artistic interest in
> >> his works. There!
> >
> >Yes -- and doesn't it look stupid? No one
> >with an interest in art would ever say it --
> >and certainly not to a friend who shared that
> >interest. So how come it seems reasonable
> >to say the same about Shakespeare?
> >Do I have to tell you?
[..]
> No, because the answer is quite obvious. While there is some
> disagreement over who wrote the works of Shakespeare, there is no
> comparable debate (I don't think) over who created the works of
> Michelangelo. If there were such a debate, then we would have to
> state the obvious about Michelangelo, as we do about Shakespeare in
> our discussions in this newsgroup.
That's (i) not true; and (ii) a cop-out. Your
expression of opinion had nothing to do with
any authorship matter. And the notions that he
wrote (a) only for money; (b) for a mass-market
(c) without any conception of an overall purpose
and without any artistic intention . . . . . are all
standard parts of the Stratfordian ideology.
They form a fully integrated whole and are
entirely recognisable.
What would the mass-market want with ART?
Why write for such a market unless money is
the sole purpose? How could he have any
supervening purposes if he was churning out
yet another product to get bums on seats?
The Stratfordian conception of the man, his life
and his work is wholly at odds with everything
we see in the plays and the poems.
Why can't you admit it?
The only explanation then available to Strats for
the remarkable quality of the works (in the limited
way in which you understand them) is . . . err . . .
um . . . . err . . . . his magic pen!
Paul.
Bob Grumman
>> Shakespeare's plays were performed on the public stage, and made money.
>>
>> (1) Greene expressed jealosy of Shakespeare the playwright, and Greene was a
>> professional writer of plays for the public stage.
>
>Only a dyed-in-the-wool Strat would quote that
>as 'evidence' -- and then they have to distort
>their anatomy into hideous shapes to get it out.
Paul, you have a moron's reason for assuming that Chettle did not refer to
Shakespeare; you have not even that for supposing that Greene did not refer to
him.
>>(2) Some of the title-pages of published plays indicate that they were performed
>> on the public stage.
>
>Actually, it would be interesting to do a complete
>analysis of what it says on pages of all the
>published plays we have -- to see if the statements
>on those of WS are any different. I wonder if
>anyone has done it? References to 'performances
>before Her Majesty' would certainly be more
>common.
Why might that be, Paul? Any ideas besides the Oxfordian ones? I think it'd be
nice if the the fore-matter of all the published plays and poems were gathered
into one place. Possibly it has been.
>> (3) That they were published suggests they were being performed, and were
>> well-received.
>
>Nope.
Ah, the printers of the time were no more interested in making money by
publishing popular plays than The True Author was in making money by having his
plays publically performed.
>It suggests that some people at the
>time were capable of appreciating their value
>(what a surprise!) and didn't want to see
>them lost for ever.
It can't suggest both? It doesn't even SUGGEST that they were being performed
and were well-received?
>> (4) They were performed by the Chamberlain's/King's Men, a
>> company of players who performed a great deal on the public stage;
>
>They were the principal players for the court.
So what? They OWNED a theatre--two, at one point, in fact.
>> if these men had the plays of Shakespeare in their possession,
>> why would they not have performed them on the public stage?
>
>They probably did -- to small audiences and over short runs.
>> (5) We have the testimony of play-goers of the day who attended Shakespearean
>>plays--e.g., those who were at the Globe during the Henry VIII performance that
>> caused the Globe to burn down.
>
>The records are so fragmentary and
>haphazard that no firm conclusion can be
>drawn from them.
They show that some people saw the plays publically performed. I suspect we
have more such evidence than we have for anyone else's publically performed
plays at the time.
>>(6) Nash wrote somewhere about the popularity of a Henry VI play by Shakespeare.
>>
>> (7) Shakespeare's company was at least twice recorded
>> as being asked to perform a play, and their answers
>> indicate that they considered the plays they performed
>> as a result just plays in the repertory--
>
>*Richard II* in 1601 is one instance. What's the other?
I think it was Loves Labours Lost.
>> i.e., plays to be performed for the public.
>
>Nope. They made good money from court and
>private performances.
There doesn't seem to be any record of a professional acting company of the time
that had plays for court performances only, or primarily. It makes no sense.
Consider that the printed plays advertise their having been performed at court;
why wouldn't the same plays be performed for the public because they had been
performed at court? That is, if a play was successful at court, why wouldn't
the players take advantage of the snob appeal of a play that had done well at
court and put it on the public stage?
>>(8) We have no records of any Shakespearean play that was privately performed.
>
>What are you talking about? 38 separate performances
>(or sequences of performances) are known -- 7 at the
>Globe, 2 at the Rose, 2 at the Inns of Court, 2 at sea,
>23 at court and 2 at unknown locations. So 9 out of
>38 are public.
I meant records of plays that were known to have been performed only at court.
We DO have records of some plays that were both publically performed and
performed at court, which suggests that the plays were like other plays in being
written for the public stage--but take to court if requested. (The statistics
here don't mean much, by the way, since court performances were generally
recorded, public performances not.)
>> I'm sure there is better evidence that Shakespeare
>> wrote for the public stage than the above.
>
>Nope. There isn't.
>
>Paul.
I'll await the opinion of someone more trustworthy, Paul. Meanwhile, I
remembered another record supporting my case: a preface to Troilus and Cressida
makes a point of saying that IT was NOT "clapper-clawed" by the general public,
which suggests that it was unusual in this respect.