nonopinionatedness
Art Neuendorffer
A biography of Ann Hathaway and a social history of Shakespeare's time
by the redoubtable feminist
Reviewed by John Carey
>From The Sunday Times September 2, 2007
.
<<It is impossible to think of two minds more different than Germaine
Greer's and Shakespeare's. The leading quality of Greer's mind is
opinionatedness, whereas Shakespeare, so far as we can tell, had no
opinions. He vanished into his plays, and trying to retrieve what he
thought on any subject is like harvesting shadows.
.
This is frustrating for Greer, since her aim in her new book is to pin
down Shakespeare's opinion about marriage, specifically his own. Only
the barest facts are known for certain. When he married Ann Hathaway,
a local farmer's daughter, in 1582, he was 18, she was 26, and three
months pregnant. They married by special licence, which two of her
father's friends obtained. Susanna, their first child, was born in May
1583, and twins, Judith and Hamnet, in February 1585. Before or soon
after that Shakespeare probably left Stratford, and by 1592 he was
already well known as an actor and dramatist in London, where he spent
most of his married life. When he made his will in March 1616, a month
before his death, his wife was not mentioned at all in the first
draft, and a redraft left her his second-best bed.
.
Some scholars (most of them, Greer notes accusingly, male) have taken
these facts to mean that Shakespeare was trapped into marriage by a
designing older woman; that he was frogmarched to the altar by her
family; that, like many women of her class, she was probably
illiterate, and certainly unable to appreciate her husband's
greatness; and that his insulting bequest signifies his lifelong
alienation from her. Greer is convinced that, on the contrary,
Shakespeare wooed Ann not vice versa; that she proved a good, true
wife, enjoying her husband's love and respect; and that she took a
keen interest in his writing, and was quite possibly instrumental in
getting the first folio of his works printed after his death. Since
there is little or no evidence to support these claims, their
furtherance calls for considerable ingenuity on Greer's part.
.
She suggests that The Comedy of Errors, with its moving depiction of
wifely loyalty, reveals Shakespeare's "attitude to marriage", so he
would be unlikely to have treated Ann in the way her denigrators
allege. The weakness of such arguments is obvious - you might, with
just as little cogency, select The Taming of the Shrew as showing
Shakespeare's attitude to marriage - so most of Greer's book takes a
different tack, and contends that Ann was a highly successful woman in
her own right, so Shakespeare should have been proud of her, even if
he was not, though he probably was. Exactly what she was successful at
is difficult to decide. Greer thinks she might have been a successful
moneylender. The one surviving document that may give a clue to her
business activities, if she had any, is the will of the Hathaway
family's shepherd, which says she owes him 40 shillings. This does not
sound like successful moneylending, but perhaps, Greer thinks, the
shepherd entrusted the money to Ann's safekeeping, which could mean
she was a successful banker. Alternatively, she might have been a
farmer or a cheese maker, a mercer or a haberdasher, a basket weaver
or a lace maker or a stocking knitter. An official document records
that New Place, the big house in Stratford that Shakespeare bought in
1597, contained malt for brewing, so probably, Greer reckons, Ann was
in business as a brewer. Or maybe as a silk farmer. The mulberry tree
that Shakespeare is supposed to have planted at New Place was, Greer
suspects, the survivor of a plantation established by Ann to rear
silkworms. Wherever Ann's success lay, she made enough money, Greer
thinks, to bring up her family without her husband's help (though why
he should not have helped her if she enjoyed his love and respect is
not quite clear) and probably accumulated a lot more besides. Quite
possibly, in Greer's view, Ann, not Shakespeare, bought New Place. It
is true that no papers relating to Ann's remarkable career have come
down to us. But then, Greer reminds us, paper was scarce, and old
documents were used for all sorts of menial purposes, and there were a
lot of mice about.
.
The uncertainty of the whole situation allows Greer to fill her book
with vast amounts of extraneous material. There are lengthy
digressions on Elizabethan farming, cheese-making, haberdashery and
Ann's other supposed occupations, packed with archival detail about
the pigs, hens, household effects and genealogies of a great many
people who, as Greer is perfectly willing to accept, may have nothing
to do with Ann or Shakespeare at all. In the same spirit there are
sections on Elizabethan cottages, in case the Shakespeares ever lived
in one, though they probably did not, and a stomach-churning excursion
on venereal disease and its treatment, on the off chance that
Shakespeare suffered from it, although there is no evidence he did.
Threading this maze of blind alleys is the sort of reading experience
that brings vividly to mind the many more useful and enjoyable things
you might be doing.
.
Given Greer's interest in the denizens of Shakespeare's Stratford and
the lives they lived, it is intriguing to speculate what they would
have thought of her if some miraculous time warp had allowed her to
materialise among them. They would have been terrified at first, of
course, just as they would have been by the appearance of a jet
fighter, or any other product of our advanced civilisation. Very
likely they would have shut her away in a quiet room with some good
man of the church, in an effort to restore her wits. But I think they
would have soon perceived that she was perfectly harmless, and,
indeed, that she had decent, conventional, Christian ideas about how
people should treat each other. Before long they would have felt quite
safe in bringing their little children to look at her.
.
What prompts this conclusion are the traces of Greer the romantic
novelist that keep peeping out from behind her rigorous absorption in
archives and statistics. She likes to think that William spent long
hours teaching Ann to read as she watched her cows grazing on the
common. She pictures him writing Venus and Adonis at the kitchen
table, and reading out passages to make her blush or laugh, and she
imagines Ann "enjoying the poem's lightness of touch, even as she
shrank from its rampant sexuality". When Shakespeare's sonnets were
published, Ann, Greer fancies, would have read them with a "grim
little smile", recognizing many of them as poems that, in their
original versions, Will had written to her. "Then she would have
tucked the little book deep inside the coffer where she kept her own
possessions, opened her Bible and prayed for them both." She was
sober, industrious, patient and loving to the end, and nursed her
husband tenderly in his last illness. Fictitious though all this
undeniably is, it seems reassuringly old-world and good-hearted, and
should do something to correct Greer's reputation as a revolutionary
thinker and disturber of the peace. >>
Art Neuendorffer
Stuart Kelly 2 September 2007
Scotland on Sunday (c) 2007
SHAKESPEARE Bill BrysonHarperCollins, GBP 14.99
GERMAINE GREER Shakespeare's WifeBloomsbury, GBP 20
<<These two new books on Shakespeare, both by eminent authors, are
curiously equal and opposite in their failings. Bryson takes a vast
subject - the life of the greatest English author - and renders it
meagre: Greer takes a less obvious topic - the life of his wife - and
makes it overblown. The Scylla and Charybdis of Shakespeare scholarship
are over-caution and rampant speculation, and while Bryson is clattered
against the former, Greer is wholeheartedly swallowed up by the latter.
It is often and erroneously said that we know nothing about
Shakespeare's life. Bryson's riff runs: "We don't know if he ever left
England. We don't know who his principal companions were or how he
amused himself. His sexuality is an irreconcilable mystery... By the
time he is first mentioned in print as a playwright, in 1592, his life
was already more than half over. For the rest, he is the literary
equivalent of an electron - forever there and not there." Setting aside
the inelegant and misleading scientific comparison, Bryson sounds
remarkably like the biographical equivalent of Fawlty Tower's Manuel,
clearing his throat and sonorously pronouncing, "I know nothing".
Of course, we have the plays, and Bryson is rightly cautious about using
them as a trove of speculative biographical detail. Where was
Shakespeare during the "lost years" of 1585-1592? One scholar has
suggested, on the basis that every play has at least one reference to
the sea, that he was a sailor. As Bryson observes, there are more
references to France than to England in the plays, but we don't assume
he was French.
But he cannot resist quoting the plays when unnecessary. When describing
the rigours of Elizabethan schooling, he says: "It is easy to understand
the line in As You Like It about a boy 'creeping like snail unwillingly
to school'." Now it may well be that the man who did more for
Renaissance literature than any other might well have actually raced
eagerly to school, and moreover, have taken notice of more tardy
schoolfellows.
Bryson is good when he has evidence - the few scattered references to
Shakespeare in other works, the portraits, the legal documents, the
First Folio edition (which, as he notes, is oddly slapdash compared with
Jonson's Works). He spends rather too much time slam-dunking those who
believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl of Oxford and so
on: in my opinion, it's needless even to reiterate these claims. Bryson
writes like an anxious student, fearful than any theory will be pounced
on by waiting professors.
No such worries detain Professor Greer. Shakespeare's Wife could have
been an excellent book... if she had stuck to the misogynistic tradition
of berating Anne Hathaway and the known facts about the socio-economic
status of women in the period. But no sooner has she won an inch for
Anne Hathaway than she expands it into a mile. She is so driven in
exculpating Anne that, even when there is good evidence to back up her
claims (such as the scribal error theory for the 'other' marriage
licence between Wm Shaxpere et Annam Whateley) she fails to provide it.
(Bryson, incidentally, does).
Greer's Anne is capable, independent of mind, literate and above all
beloved, despite her husband contracting syphilis from a prostitute. By
taking evidence about other Stratford women, notably Elizabeth Quiney,
she builds a moderately compelling picture of the financial
speculations, domestic routines and marriage negotiations of a woman
like Anne Hathaway. There are intriguing readings, especially of
Cymbeline and The Comedy Of Errors. Greer identifies a new villainess in
Shakespeare's mother to account for the Lady Macbeths and Gertrudes.
But the exaggeration - or maybe tragic over-reaching - intrudes again
and again. Sonnet 145 has a pun in the penultimate line "'I hate' from
hate away she threw" that has led scholars to think the dedicatee is
Anne. So far, so good. What this does not prove is that any other sonnet
is dedicated to Anne.
There are tangential links between the Hathaway family and the London
theatrical scene: one Richard Hathway was a playwright, and Anne's
father may have had a connection with the Hemmings family, one of whom
would be instrumental in publishing Shakespeare's works. Not content,
Greer goes on to make Anne the invisible hand in publishing
Shakespeare's work. There is, as she admits, no evidence for that; but
she asserts there is no evidence Anne did not help publish the Folio.
There is also no evidence that Anne did not solve Fermat's Last Theorem,
climb Ben Nevis or have three eyes.
It is such a rich field I cannot understand why Bryson and Greer did not
do more with what we do have. I'll give two examples. In the late,
redemptive play The Winter's Tale, written just before Shakespeare
returned to Anne and Stratford, Leontes commissions a statue of his dead
wife, whom he wrongly accused of adultery. The statue, at the end, comes
to life: Hermione was never dead but awaiting his repentance. For Greer
this should be dynamite. For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd
that at the same time, King James commissions a statue of his wronged
mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the Nurse, "Susan and
she - God rest all Christian souls! / Were of an age. Well, Susan is
with God; / She was too good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same
year that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister was called
Susannah, and the name appears in none of Shakespeare's other plays.
Perhaps if Greer had some of Bryson's wariness, and Bryson some of
Greer's imagination, these could have been a pair of valuable additions. >>
--------------------------------------
Peter Farey
Art Neuendorffer wrote:
>
> Book Reviews: Much ado about nothing
> Stuart Kelly 2 September 2007
> Scotland on Sunday (c) 2007
>
> GERMAINE GREER Shakespeare's Wife Bloomsbury, GBP 20
<snip>
> He spends rather too much time slam-dunking those who
> believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl
> of Oxford and so on: in my opinion, it's needless even
> to reiterate these claims.
<snip>
> It is such a rich field I cannot understand why Bryson
> and Greer did not do more with what we do have. I'll
> give two examples. In the late, redemptive play The
> Winter's Tale, written just before Shakespeare returned
> to Anne and Stratford, Leontes commissions a statue of
> his dead wife, whom he wrongly accused of adultery. The
> statue, at the end, comes to life: Hermione was never
> dead but awaiting his repentance. For Greer this should
> be dynamite.
Wrongly accused? Assumed dead but not really? Awaiting a
monarch's repentance? What relevance could that possibly
have to real life?
> For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd that
> at the same time, King James commissions a statue of
> his wronged mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
There is no question whatsoever of Leontes having "comm-
issioned" a statue of Hermione. It's all Paulina's idea,
and he apparently first hears of it when Perdita does.
> And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the
> Nurse, "Susan and she - God rest all Christian souls! /
> Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God; / She was too
> good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same year
> that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister
> was called Susannah, and the name appears in none of
> Shakespeare's other plays.
Hamnet was buried in August 1596. I have seen a possible
date for R&J given by Taylor, Schoenbaum, Chambers, Bloom
and in the Riverside, and every one of them prefers 1595.
In fact Brian Gibbons (Arden edition) says.
"By March 1597 Shakespeare's play had been performed,
and the reporters of the Q1 version had had time to
make their reconstruction, and sell it to the printer.
This sequence of events must have required several
months at least, indicating that Shakespeare completed
his play no later than the spring of 1596. In fact it
has been usual to assign the play to 1595."
> Perhaps if Greer had some of Bryson's wariness, and
> Bryson some of Greer's imagination, these could have
> been a pair of valuable additions. >>
And perhaps if this guy knew a little more what he was
talking about, his pronouncements on the authorship
question might carry a little more weight. :o)
Peter F.
<pet...@rey.prestel.co.uk>
<http://www2.prestel.co.uk/rey/index.htm>
Paul Crowley
news:fbluvm$99e$1$8300...@news.demon.co.uk...
>> Book Reviews: Much ado about nothing
>> Stuart Kelly 2 September 2007
>> Scotland on Sunday (c) 2007
>>
>> SHAKESPEARE Bill Bryson HarperCollins, GBP 14.99
>> GERMAINE GREER Shakespeare's Wife Bloomsbury, GBP 20
>
> <snip>
>> And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the
>> Nurse, "Susan and she - God rest all Christian souls! /
>> Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God; / She was too
>> good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same year
>> that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister
>> was called Susannah, and the name appears in none of
>> Shakespeare's other plays.
Hamnet's twin was Judith.
Susannah was two years older.
> Hamnet was buried in August 1596. I have seen a possible
> date for R&J given by Taylor, Schoenbaum, Chambers, Bloom
> and in the Riverside, and every one of them prefers 1595.
> In fact Brian Gibbons (Arden edition) says.
>
> "By March 1597 Shakespeare's play had been performed,
> and the reporters of the Q1 version had had time to
> make their reconstruction, and sell it to the printer.
> This sequence of events must have required several
> months at least, indicating that Shakespeare completed
> his play no later than the spring of 1596. In fact it
> has been usual to assign the play to 1595."
>
>> Perhaps if Greer had some of Bryson's wariness, and
>> Bryson some of Greer's imagination, these could have
>> been a pair of valuable additions. >>
>
> And perhaps if this guy knew a little more what he was
> talking about, his pronouncements on the authorship
> question might carry a little more weight. :o)
Strats have to grasp at straws -- and
often find it necessary to invent them.
But Marlites are in no position to
criticise.
Paul.
Art Neuendorffer
>> Book Reviews: Much ado about nothing
>> Stuart Kelly 2 September 2007
>> Scotland on Sunday (c) 2007
>>
>> SHAKESPEARE Bill Bryson HarperCollins, GBP 14.99
>> GERMAINE GREER Shakespeare's Wife Bloomsbury, GBP 20
>>
>> believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl
>> of Oxford and so on: in my opinion, it's needless even
>> to reiterate these claims.
>>
>> and Greer did not do more with what we do have. I'll
>> give two examples. In the late, redemptive play The
>> Winter's Tale, written just before Shakespeare returned
>> to Anne and Stratford, Leontes commissions a statue of
>> his dead wife, whom he wrongly accused of adultery. The
>> statue, at the end, comes to life: Hermione was never
>> dead but awaiting his repentance. For Greer this should
>> be dynamite.
Peter F. wrote:
>
>Wrongly accused? Assumed dead but not really? Awaiting a
>monarch's repentance? What relevance could that possibly
>have to real life?
It has to do with Oxford's real life.
.
> Stuart Kelly wrote:
>>
>> For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd that
>> at the same time, King James commissions a statue of
>> his wronged mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
Peter F. wrote:
>
>There is no question whatsoever of Leontes having "comm-
>issioned" a statue of Hermione. It's all Paulina's idea,
>and he apparently first hears of it when Perdita does.
It would seem reasonable that Leontes commissioned the
expensive Italian statue way back in the good old days
and has only now consented to have the work completed:
....................................................
Gent.3. : The Princesse hearing of her Mothers Statue
. (which is in the keeping of Paulina) a Peece many
. yeeres in doing, and now newly perform'd, by that rare
. Italian Master, Iulio Romano, who (had he himselfe Eter-
. nitie, and could put Breath into his Worke) would be-
. guile Nature of her Custome, so perfectly he is her Ape:
. He so neere to Hermione, hath done Hermione, that they
. say one would speake to her, and stand in hope of answer.
. Thither (with all greedinesse of affection) are
. they gone, and there they intend to Sup.
....................................................
> Stuart Kelly wrote:
>>
>> And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the
>> Nurse, "Susan and she - God rest all Christian souls! /
>> Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God; / She was too
>> good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same year
>> that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister
>> was called Susannah, and the name appears in none of
>> Shakespeare's other plays.
--------------------------------------
Paul Crowley wrote:
>
> Hamnet's twin was Judith.
> Susannah was two years older.
..............................................
The Apocryphal *JUDITH* & *SUSANNA* were both invoked by the
Catholic Bishop of ROSS in describing the virtues of Mary QUEEN
of Scots during her 1586 trial; (de Vere & R. Sadler were there).
. - p.89 Shakespeare a life by Park Honan.
--------------------------------------------------
St CLEMENT's Day
------------------
Nov 23, 1590, Marriage of James VI & Anne of Denmark
.
Nov 23, 1616, JUDITH Shakspere Quiney baptizes Shakespeare
Nov 23, 1616, Hakluyt dies
-----------------------------------------------------------
Feb 10, 1616, "M. Tho. QUEENY tow JUDITH Shakspere."
_____ - 7×7
----------------
Feb 10, 1567, M. QUEEN of Scots blows Henry Stuart
.
Feb 10, 1605, Merchant of Venice performed for James Stuart
------------------------------------------------------------
Feb 9, 1976, Stephen Neuendorffer born
Feb 9, 1618, JUDITH Shakspere Quiney baptizes Richard.
_____ +44
--------------
Feb 9, 1662, JUDITH Shakspere Quiney buried.
Feb 13, 1662, Elizabeth Stuart dies.
_____ - 7×7
-----------------
Feb 14, 1613, Elizabeth StUART becomes "Queen of Bohemia"
_____ +333
--------------
Feb 14, 1946, ART Neuendorffer born
---------------------------------------------------------
Peter F. wrote:
>
> Hamnet was buried in August 1596. I have seen a possible
> date for R&J given by Taylor, Schoenbaum, Chambers, Bloom
> and in the Riverside, and every one of them prefers 1595.
> In fact Brian Gibbons (Arden edition) says.
>
> "By March 1597 Shakespeare's play had been performed,
> and the reporters of the Q1 version had had time to
> make their reconstruction, and sell it to the printer.
> This sequence of events must have required several
> months at least, indicating that Shakespeare completed
> his play no later than the spring of 1596. In fact it
> has been usual to assign the play to 1595."
-------------------------------------------------
Will Shakspere & Edward de Vere both had favorite daughters
named SUSAN who were born on St. AUGUSTINE's day May 26:
__ SUSANna Shak. was born on May 26, 1583
__ SUSAN Vere was born on May 26, 1587
-------------------------------------------------
The Susans part could have been added any time before the Quartos:
...........................................
Romeo and Juliet (Quarto 1, 1597)
.
Nurce:Euen or odde, of all dayes in the yeare come
. Lammas Eue at night shall she be fourteene. Susan and she
. God rest all Christian soules were of an age. VVell Susan is
. with God, she was too good for me: But as I said on Lam-
. mas Eue at night shall she be fourteene, that shall shee ma-
. rie I remember it well. Tis since the Earth-quake nowe e-
. leauen yeares, and she was weand I neuer shall forget it, of
. all the daies of the yeare vpon that day: for I had then laid
. wormewood to my dug, sitting in the sun vnder the Doue-
. housewall. My Lord and you were then at Mantua, nay I
. do beare a braine: But as I said, when it did tast the worm-
. wood on the nipple of my dug, & felt it bitter, pretty foole
...........................................
. Romeo and Juliet (Quarto 2, 1599)
.
1. : When good *MANNERS SHALL LIE* all in one or two mens
. *HANDS* And they VNWASHT* too, tis a foule thing.
.
3. : We cannot be here and there too, chearely boyes,
looke to the plate, good thou, saue me a peece of
March-pane, and as thou loues me, let the PORTER let
in *SUSAN* Grindstone, and NELL, Anthonie and Potpan.
---------------------------------------------
> Stuart Kelly wrote:
>>
>> Perhaps if Greer had some of Bryson's wariness, and
>> Bryson some of Greer's imagination, these could have
>> been a pair of valuable additions. >>
.
Peter F. wrote:
>
>And perhaps if this guy knew a little more what he was
>talking about, his pronouncements on the authorship
>question might carry a little more weight. :o)
.
Art Neuendorffer
nordicskiv2
Art Neuendorffer <aneuendor...@comcast.net>
(aneuendor...@comicass.nut) wrote:
[...]
> SHAKESPEARE Bill BrysonHarperCollins, GBP 14.99
[...]
> Bryson is good when he has evidence - the few scattered references to
> Shakespeare in other works, the portraits, the legal documents, the
> First Folio edition (which, as he notes, is oddly slapdash compared with
> Jonson's Works). He spends rather too much time slam-dunking those who
> believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl of Oxford and so
> on: in my opinion, it's needless even to reiterate these claims.
True.
> Bryson
> writes like an anxious student, fearful than any theory will be pounced
> on by waiting professors.
[...]
But Art -- what do you make of the fact that, until recently, Bill
Bryson resided in Hanover (Ha! No Ver!), New Hampshire, that notorious
nexus of the Shakespeare Authorship Coverup Conspiracy? And what
about his celebrated book _[A] Short [History] [of] N[Earl]y [E]
[Ver]ything_? Have you figured out yet why the Grand Master sent
Bryson abroad? Surely you aren't going to neglect to weave Bryson
into your all-encompassing conspiracy theory, are you, Art?
Art Neuendorffer
>
> But Art -- what do you make of the fact that, until recently, Bill
> Bryson resided in Hanover (Ha! No Ver!), New Hampshire, that notorious
> nexus of the Shakespeare Authorship Coverup Conspiracy? And what
> about his celebrated book _[A] Short [History] [of] N[Earl]y [E]
> [Ver]ything_? Have you figured out yet why the Grand Master sent
> Bryson abroad? Surely you aren't going to neglect to weave Bryson
> into your all-encompassing conspiracy theory, are you, Art?
Okey Doke
Art Neuendorffer
bobgr...@nut-n-but.net
wrote:
> Art Neuendorffer wrote:
>
> > Book Reviews: Much ado about nothing
> > Stuart Kelly 2 September 2007
> > Scotland on Sunday (c) 2007
>
> > SHAKESPEARE Bill Bryson HarperCollins, GBP 14.99
> > GERMAINE GREER Shakespeare's Wife Bloomsbury, GBP 20
>
> <snip>
>
> > He spends rather too much time slam-dunking those who
> > believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl
> > of Oxford and so on: in my opinion, it's needless even
> > to reiterate these claims.
>
> <snip>
>
> > It is such a rich field I cannot understand why Bryson
> > and Greer did not do more with what we do have. I'll
> > give two examples. In the late, redemptive play The
> > Winter's Tale, written just before Shakespeare returned
> > to Anne and Stratford, Leontes commissions a statue of
> > his dead wife, whom he wrongly accused of adultery. The
> > statue, at the end, comes to life: Hermione was never
> > dead but awaiting his repentance. For Greer this should
> > be dynamite.
>
> Wrongly accused? Assumed dead but not really? Awaiting a
> monarch's repentance? What relevance could that possibly
> have to real life?
You're being too literal-minded, Peter. How about wrongly accused,
geographically render dead, awaiting a husband's repentance--which she
gets when the husband returns for good from London?
> > For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd that
> > at the same time, King James commissions a statue of
> > his wronged mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
>
> There is no question whatsoever of Leontes having "comm-
> issioned" a statue of Hermione. It's all Paulina's idea,
> and he apparently first hears of it when Perdita does.
Come on, Peter.
> > And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the
> > Nurse, "Susan and she - God rest all Christian souls! /
> > Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God; / She was too
> > good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same year
> > that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister
> > was called Susannah, and the name appears in none of
> > Shakespeare's other plays.
>
> Hamnet was buried in August 1596. I have seen a possible
> date for R&J given by Taylor, Schoenbaum, Chambers, Bloom
> and in the Riverside, and every one of them prefers 1595.
> In fact Brian Gibbons (Arden edition) says.
> "By March 1597 Shakespeare's play had been performed,
> and the reporters of the Q1 version had had time to
> make their reconstruction, and sell it to the printer.
> This sequence of events must have required several
> months at least, indicating that Shakespeare completed
> his play no later than the spring of 1596. In fact it
> has been usual to assign the play to 1595."
It could easily not have been finished till after August 1596.
--Bob G.
bobgr...@nut-n-but.net
> Strats have to grasp at straws -- and
> often find it necessary to invent them.
> But Marlites are in no position to
> criticise.
>
> Paul.
Yep, straws like his name on forty books published during his life,
and his picture in the First Folio, and the monument. As opposed to
real evidence like a common name that has to do with shaking a spear,
which is just what every literate person visualizes right away when
thinking of a poet, especially of Shakespeare.
Bob G.
Peter Farey
Bob Grumman wrote:
And how about the author (literally) thinking that he was
wrongly accused, was (literally) assumed dead but wasn't
really, and was (literally) awaiting a monarch's repentance
over what had happened to him? Rather closer, I'd say.
> > > For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd that
> > > at the same time, King James commissions a statue of
> > > his wronged mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
> >
> > There is no question whatsoever of Leontes having "comm-
> > issioned" a statue of Hermione. It's all Paulina's idea,
> > and he apparently first hears of it when Perdita does.
>
> Come on, Peter.
You come on, Bob. Precisely where in *The Winter's Tale* is
there any indication whatsoever that Leontes "commissioned"
any statue? In case you have forgotten, there *was* no statue
anyway. Stuart Kelly is criticizing Bryson (whom I have no
good reason to defend) for failing to mention something
that Shakespeare never wrote or even suggested!
> > > And in Romeo and Juliet, we have the odd lines of the
> > > Nurse, "Susan and she - God rest all Christian souls! /
> > > Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God; / She was too
> > > good for me". Written in 1596, this was the same year
> > > that Shakespeare's son Hamnet died. Hamnet's twin sister
> > > was called Susannah, and the name appears in none of
> > > Shakespeare's other plays.
> >
> > Hamnet was buried in August 1596. I have seen a possible
> > date for R&J given by Taylor, Schoenbaum, Chambers, Bloom
> > and in the Riverside, and every one of them prefers 1595.
> > In fact Brian Gibbons (Arden edition) says.
>
> > "By March 1597 Shakespeare's play had been performed,
> > and the reporters of the Q1 version had had time to
> > make their reconstruction, and sell it to the printer.
> > This sequence of events must have required several
> > months at least, indicating that Shakespeare completed
> > his play no later than the spring of 1596. In fact it
> > has been usual to assign the play to 1595."
>
> It could easily not have been finished till after August
> 1596.
Kelly stated as a *fact* that it was written after Hamnet's
death, which is counter to every single orthodox chronology
I have been able to find, and criticized Bryson for missing
it. Argue with them, not me.
Art Neuendorffer
good stuff secret by making all of it soberly unfathomable.
-------------------------------------------------------------
____ STRATFORD upon Avon
________ Guild Chapel
_______ white-WASHING
_______ CHAMBERLAIN
________ ALDERMAN/Bailiff
_________________________ /----------------------\
______________ John ----- MARY MARgerY Webbe
_____ [wrote his 'marke'] | [wrote her 'marke']__[d. St.Adrian's]
__[bur. St.Adrian's Day]- | [d. St.Adrian's Day]
_________________ |
_______ /---------------\ ___________ [illiterate]
. MARgerY Shakspere ------------ Anne
_______________ | [b. 1556]
_ [BROOK House] | [only son,
___ [Shaxpere's Boys] | b.1584, dies]
___- [Shaxpere Gloves] |
|||||| [Cervantes' "lame hand" ] |
___ [W. Smith mentor] |
|||||| [Catholic Relatives persecuted] |
____ [Thomas Trussell] |
_ [Sweet Swan of Avon] |
___ [By ME : WIL(cu)L] |
____- [Bend Spear crest] |
_______- [Golding's 'OVID'] |
__ [Camden's: 'pregnant witt'] |
______ [Qu. of Scots Trial] |
___ [Yoricke's Scounce] |
___ ["Gentleman" poet] |
_ [NESTOR reference] |
|||||||||| [MERMAID tAVERn] |
____ ['For TRUTH is TRUTH'] |
_____- [Paul's 'I am that I am'] |
|||||| [Hamlet's 'To Be or not To Be'] |
|||||||||| [stole from Raphael Holinshed] |
__ [TINer of AVERland] |
- [1586 deer park poacher] |
||||||||||||||||| [1616 Faust/FAMA Frat. death] |
|||||||||||||||||| [John Manningham's 1602 diary] |
_-- [£1,000/year for 18 years] |
_ [- Item, £10 unto the poore ] |
| [ARD(en) plot/tower/exec.] |
------___ [7 Year exile for indiscretion] |
||||||| [Hothead Gastrell: Esdras 6:9] |
||||||||||||||||||| [Anne Cornwaleys book 1588?] |
|||||||||||||| [not a *COMPANY* keeper ] |
|||||||||| [Richard Field recognized 1593] |
||||||||||||||||| [Meres' Top 10 in comedy 1598] |
|||||||||||||||||||[Baroness Elizabeth of Abbingdon] |
|||||||||||||||||||[drunken B.Knell suicide attack] |
________________ |
|||||||||||||||| [falcon w./spear in dexter CLAW] |
_____ [ Henry Evans > |
|||| 1608 Lessor of Blackfriars Th.] |
||||||||||||||||| dies unnoticed / tomb unmarked |
||||| Church Burial Record "X"ed |
________________ |
_ Hall M.D. -------- SVSANna
|||||||| [d. on Lope de Vega's 73rd birthday [b.May 26, 1583]
_ 3 mo. after Lope dies] ____ [could write name]
______________________________________
-----------------------------------------------------
_____ STRATFORD atte Bowe
________ Pontius Pilate
______ hand-WASHING
___ GREAT CHAMBERLAIN
_____ EALDORMAN/Bailiff
_______ John ----------- MARgerY
________ |
___ /-----------\ ___ m. on OPALIA [Sonneteer]
. MARY Oxford --------------- Anne
________________ | [b. 1556]
- [BROOKE House] |[only son dies
_______ [Oxford's Boys] | b.May 1583]
_______- [Oxford Gloves] |
_ [Cervantes' "lame hand" ] |
______ [T. Smith mentor] |
|||| [Catholic Relatives persecuted] |
_____ [Thomas Trussell] |
___ [Sweet Oxford/Ned] |
___ [yb NV : DRO(fx)O] |
______- [bent Spear crest] |
_______ [Golding's 'OVID'] |
__ [Golding's 'pregnancy of wit'] |
______ [Qu. of Scots Trial] |
__- [Yorke's Scounces] |
___ ["Gentleman" poet] |
- [NESTOR reference] |
|||||||||||| [MERMAID grand-dam] |
____ ['For TRUTH is TRUTH'] |
______ [Paul's 'I am that I am'] |
- [Hamlet's 'være eller ikke være'] |
|||||||||| [judged by Raphael Holinshed] |
__ [TINner of VEREland] |
_ [1604 deer park warden] |
|||||||||||||||[1604 Faust/FAMA Frat. death] |
|||||||||||||| [John Manningham's 1602 diary] |
___ [£1,000/year for 18 years] |
__ [- Item, £10 unto a Beggar ] |
|| [(how)ARD plot/tower/exec.] |
____- [7 Year exile for indiscretion] |
|| [Hothead Gastrell: Esdras 6:9] |
|||||||||| [Anne Cornwaleys book 1588?] ||| |
||||||||| [denouncing aye the *Company* ] ||||| |
|| [Richard Field recognized 1589] ||| |
||||||||| [Meres' Top 10 in comedy 1598] ||| |
|||||| [Baroness Elizabeth of Abingdon] || |
|||||| [drunken B-Knell suicide attack] || |
___________________ |
||||||||| [lion w./broken lance in dexter PAW]|| |
________ [ Henry Evans > |
_ 1583 Lessor of Blackfriars Th.] |
|||||||||||| dies unnoticed / tomb unmarked |
- Church Burial Record "X"ed |
__________________ |
______ Herbert (Philip) ----- SVSAN
|||||||| [b. St. LONGINUS day] [b. May 26]
________________________________________________________
.
>>SHAKESPEARE Bill Bryson HarperCollins, GBP 14.99
>>
>>Shakespeare in other works, the portraits, the legal documents, the
>>First Folio edition (which, as he notes, is oddly slapdash compared with
>>Jonson's Works). He spends rather too much time slam-dunking those who
>>believe Shakespeare was Bacon, Mary Sidney, the Earl of Oxford and so
>>writes like an anxious student, fearful than any theory will be pounced
>>on by waiting professors.
>
>
> But Art -- what do you make of the fact that, until recently, Bill
> Bryson resided in Hanover (Ha! No Ver!), New Hampshire, that notorious
> nexus of the Shakespeare Authorship Coverup Conspiracy? And what
> about his celebrated book _[A] Short [History] [of] N[Earl]y [E]
> [Ver]ything_? Have you figured out yet why the Grand Master sent
> Bryson abroad? Surely you aren't going to neglect to weave Bryson
> into your all-encompassing conspiracy theory, are you, Art?
_[A] Short [History] [of] N[Earl]y [E.Ver]ything_
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Short_History_of_Nearly_Everything
"It was as if [the textbook writer] wanted to keep the good stuff
secret by making all of it soberly unfathomable." - Bryson,
.
. <<Errors in the book
.
1. There is at least one incorrect proof of a principle in the book.
Where Bryson discusses the structure of glass as being that of a
supercooled liquid he provides proof by stating that panes of old
cathedral glass are thicker at the bottom than at the top, thus
'proving' that the glass has flowed (and swelled) due to the effects of
gravity. Whilst glass resembles a super cooled liquid in structure, it
is in fact a solid and cathedral glass is actually thicker at the bottom
because of the way the glass was made, cut, and then used, with the
thicker ends being placed on the bottom edge of the panes to better
withstand the load from above.
.
2. There is also at least one mathematical error, which occurs in the
second paragraph of the first chapter when Bryson tries to explain the
size of a proton. He claims that the number of protons in a "dib of ink"
is "rather more than the number of seconds contained in half a million
years." There are more than 15 trillion seconds in half a million years,
which is rather more than the 500,000,000,000 protons he estimates
to be in the dib of ink.
.
3. In Chapter 23 ("The Richness of Being"), there appears to be a
significant error regarding the findings of a botanist in Borneo, as
well as a grossly exaggerated narration of the manner in which the
botanist worked to arrive at the findings.
.
In the last section of Chapter 23, Bryson makes the point that there are
a vast number of species of plants and animals which have not yet been
discovered by science. Regarding the reasons for this, he asks (at page
442, 2003 Black Swan paperback edition), "So why do we know as little as
we do? There are nearly as many reasons as there are animals left to
count, but here are a few of the principal causes."In a sub-section on
this point entitled "We don't look in the right places.", Bryson goes on
to state (at page 444), "In The Diversity of Life, Wilson describes how
one botanist spent a few days tramping around 10 hectres of jungle in
Borneo and discovered a thousand new species of flowering plant - more
than are found in the whole of North America. The plants weren't hard to
find. It's just that no-one had looked there before."In fact, in the
book The Diversity of Life (at Chapter 10, page 197, 1999 Norton
paperback edition), the author Edward O. Wilson states, "The world
record for tree diversity at one site was set by Alwyn Gentry in the
rain forest near Iquitos, Peru. He found about 300 species in each of
two 1-hectare (2.5-acre) plots. Peter Ashton discovered over 1,000
species in a combined census of ten selected hectare plots in Borneo.
These numbers are to be compared with 700 native species found in all of
the United States and Canada, in every major habitat from the mangrove
swamps of Florida to the coniferous forests of Labrador." In the
endnotes to Chapter 10, the author adds: "Peter S. Ashton's unpublished
estimates of Bornean tree diversity were provided in a personal
communication."It is clear from the context that what Wilson means is
that the botanist Ashton had made a census of ten selected hectare plots
in Borneo and found ("discovered") there to have been over 1,000 species
in existence. This number of over 1,000 in the Bornean census is to be
compared with 300 species in the Peruvian site and 700 in the whole of
the United States and Canada. Therefore, it is certainly not the case,
as Bryson reports in making his point that there is much new to be
easily discovered, that Ashton had "discovered a thousand new species of
flowering plant", just by spending "a few days tramping around ten
hectares of jungle in Borneo". It is also highly improbable, if not
impossible, as a matter of logic, for any botanist to have been able to
discover 1,000 new species of flowering plant (i.e. new to science) just
by tramping around a forest for a few days.In fact, Wilson also does not
state the duration spent by Ashton in making the survey (therefore, it
could well have been several months or more), whereas Bryson reports as
a matter of fact that it was just "a few days". Further, Wilson also
does not state, as reported by Bryson, that "The plants weren't hard to
find. It's just that no-one had looked there before." Wilson neither
states that they were easy or difficult to find, or whether anyone had
looked there before. Bryson's slant on the Wilson account therefore
arguably could have been made for the purpose of entertaining his
readers, or could have arisen from an unbridled enthusiasm with the
subject at hand.The facts and impression conveyed by Bryson here
therefore appear to be incorrect, exaggerated, and wholly taken
out of context.
-------------------------------------------
Art Neuendorffer
bobgr...@nut-n-but.net
> > > > and Greer did not do more with what we do have. I'll
> > > > give two examples. In the late, redemptive play The
> > > > Winter's Tale, written just before Shakespeare returned
> > > > to Anne and Stratford, Leontes commissions a statue of
> > > > his dead wife, whom he wrongly accused of adultery. The
> > > > statue, at the end, comes to life: Hermione was never
> > > > dead but awaiting his repentance. For Greer this should
> > > > be dynamite.
>
> > > Wrongly accused? Assumed dead but not really? Awaiting a
> > > monarch's repentance? What relevance could that possibly
> > > have to real life?
>
> > You're being too literal-minded, Peter. How about wrongly
> > accused, geographically render dead, awaiting a husband's
> > repentance--which she gets when the husband returns for
> > good from London?
>
> And how about the author (literally) thinking that he was
> wrongly accused, was (literally) assumed dead but wasn't
> really, and was (literally) awaiting a monarch's repentance
> over what had happened to him? Rather closer, I'd say.
I was simply pointing out the parallel to real life--if the author is
allowed a little creativity. The parallel between Shakespeare's
return to Stratford and WT is weak but there. The parallel between
your imaginary Marlowe scenario and WT is stronger, I agree.
> > > > For Bryson, if nothing else, it ought to be odd that
> > > > at the same time, King James commissions a statue of
> > > > his wronged mother, Mary Queen of Scots.
>
> > > There is no question whatsoever of Leontes having "comm-
> > > issioned" a statue of Hermione. It's all Paulina's idea,
> > > and he apparently first hears of it when Perdita does.
>
> > Come on, Peter.
>
> You come on, Bob. Precisely where in *The Winter's Tale* is
> there any indication whatsoever that Leontes "commissioned"
> any statue
My point is that you're again being too picky. The parallel is of
someone's making a statue to a wronged female, or being thought to--
whatever.
>Peter F.
I just checked the post I was responding to and it still seems to me
I've been responding to things you said. Specifically, three places
you (I thought) called Kelly on statements that I found to be, for
reasons I've shown, to be reasonable.
--Bob G.