Longtime readers know that among my numerous other eccentricities, I think Edward de Vere, the seventeenth Earl of Oxford, is the true author of the plays and poems attributed to "William Shakespeare."
The overwhelming majority of Shakespeare scholars reject this idea, though I have not been very impressed with their arguments.
Now comes word that one of the foremost "orthodox" Shakespeare scholars in the world has made a rather interesting public statement on this question.
The blog of the Shakespeare Oxford Society reports on a recent "orthodox" gathering in which the various biographies of William Shakespeare were discussed. In the midst of much learned talk about the many bios that have followed Nicholas Rowe's pioneering 1709 effort, the editor of the peer-viewed journal Critical Survey slipped in a few intriguing words.
Quoth the SOS blog:
From an Oxfordian point of view, most startling of all was the declaration made by
Professor Graham Holderness, University of Herefordshire. In the middle of a discussion re the questionable facticity of tales of deer-poaching, calf-killing and horse-holding, he stated baldly – without further comment:
If you were to construct a biography which ticked all the boxes – if you were to read Shakespeare’s plays and infer a biography from it – it wouldn’t be Rowe’s, it would actually be the Earl of Oxford’s.
Hmm. The devil you say.
The statement is, of course, quite true, as any reader of Mark Anderson's
"Shakespeare" By Another Name can affirm. To give one example, the parallels between Oxford's life and the storyline of
All's Well That Ends Well are ridiculously obvious. Like the fictional Bertram, Oxford was pressured into marrying a lower-born woman he despised, after which he fled abroad (apparently without consummating the marriage), only to be eventually reconciled with his wife by means of a "
bed trick."
Or consider Henry IV, Part 1, which includes an ahistorical episode in which the riotous Prince Hal and some friends, wearing disguises, engage in an act of banditry at Gad's Hill. In May of 1573, de Vere and his friends robbed two servants of Lord Burghley (de Vere's father-in-law), as a merry prank. Where did the incident take place? Gad's Hill.*
Multiply such "coincidences" by a factor of 100 or more, and it's abundantly clear that Oxford's biography fits the Shakespearean canon like a cheveril glove. It's kind of an open secret, actually.
What's startling is to have someone as distinguished as Professor Holderness blurt it out — and to an audience of Shakespearean academics, no less.
—–
*Oxfordians believe that
The Famous Victories of Henry V (registered in 1594), which introduces the Gad's Hill incident, was itself written by de Vere as an early attempt at telling the story of Prince Hal. See
this essay for details.