h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: The Shakespeare Conspiracy, Conspiracy. - A87797443
Author: pebblederook-makes idiocy appear simple - U14291825

A response to an throwaway remark by a reviewer, thus creating a dreadful warning to all to be very careful what you say.

Scripts were worth money and were commissioned by a patron. There was a lot of jealousy among the writers of the day.

I hope you find this potted history of the Royal Shakespeare Company useful: A49011419

lil

Scripts were also owned by the playing companies not by the dramatist. They were valuable properties and jealously guarded. Only when their commercial prospects had been totally mined or in times of dearth (when theatres were shut due to plague) would they be passed on to a printer for publication.

Once printed the manuscript had no further value except as scrap paper and it is probable that many of Shakespeares (and others) great dramas ended up as reinforcements to book bindings, twists to use to curl ladies hair, and carefully cut and looped hanging in the printers jakes.

This is the reason that hardly any play scripts survive in manuscript, and none are mentioned in wills.

*makes encouraging noises and for all*

I love it. Nicely done.

And I say this, having been of the opinion that the de Vere people had a good case since, oh, about 1973...

But then, I don't really care who wrote the plays. I just enjoy them. However, I find the aspersions cast on all sides by the various theorists to be very enlightening as to human nature.

Of course it couldn't be de Vere - the notion that you would actually need an *education* to write all that is appallingly elitist...any true-born Englishman could do it...

Dmitri Gheorgheni: Thank you.

To an extent I would say that the play's the thing no matter who wrote it although I have a feeling that if Jeffrey Archer turned up on a chat show and claimed he had ghost written the works of Douglas Adams, not a few people here might get a little upset

I also feel that it is possible to engage Oxfordians and Baconians and, especially over a pint or a pipe, Whatelians, without resorting to name calling.

I actually find the use of the expression 'poor mad Delia Bacon' extremely offensive. She did indeed suffer a mental collapse at the end of her life but for most of it she was regarded as a highly intelligent scholar.

And as for Thomas Looney; It is pronounced Loany not Loony and even if it were pronounced Loony it no more defines him than my mate Pete Smart who still struggles to tie his shoelaces.

Excellent points, all.

I agree with you - all those cheap shots are...well, cheap. For her day, I suspect Delia Bacon was a wonder. Temporal provincialism dogs them all.

Have you read Mark Twain's 'Is Shakespeare Dead?' The great author's take on the controversy in his day is unique.