?? Shakspere Oxford Bacon ??

?? Marlowe Derby Rutland ??

 

The obvious answer to this question is the traditional answer: the actor from Stratford-upon-Avon whom the heretics sometimes designate William Shakspere. But this answer does not satisfy various doubters who prefer some other candidate to be the greatest Elizabethan literary genius. This page provides some information and links about the 6 most popular contenders, including Shakspere. Other contenders have included Sir Philip Sidney, his sister the Countess of Pembroke, Sir Walter Ralegh, and Queen Elizabeth I, but the best "evidence" exists for those listed below. In the quasi-scholarly shadow world of the Shakespeare authorship question, what counts as authoritative can be difficult to determine. I selected the books that seemed to be important to the cause for which they were written. I chose the links among many dozens as the ones that seemed to provide the most information and links regarding their subjects. Many, such as the Oxford Society links, as about as authoritative as one can find when one disregards the opinion of virtually every professional literary scholar who has studied the question.

Personally, I have no investment in who wrote Shakespeare. I believe, along with T.S. Eliot, that "honest criticism and sensitive appreciation is directed not upon the poet but upon the poetry." These days that may be a minority opinion. Regardless, finding the "real" author of the plays and poems of Shakespeare would have a major effect, from a literary point of view, only on those who judge the artist and not the art, as an alleged Rembrandt that has been debunked loses its value. The conspiracy theorists sometimes accuse the "Stratfordians" of conspiring against their candidate. That few Shakespeare scholars and readers care one way or the other seems a more likely explanation of the case. And, applying Occam's Razor to this situation, the best answer to the question seems to be the Stratford candidate. The positive evidence is not entirely compelling, hence the controversy, but there is some good evidence as well as 400 years of tradition behind that answer. The evidence for another candidate, as anyone who reads John Mitchell's Who Wrote Shakespeare? will discover, all seems very persuasive when presented the right way, until the next candidate's evidence is presented. Part of the problem is, no one can offer conclusive proof, and those arguing against the Stratford candidate are often of dubious authority. Until someone with authority can offer conclusive proof for another candidate, the safest answer seems to be the the traditional answer. Perhaps the largest unanswered Shakespeare question is why anyone would bother arguing about this at all.

An entertaining if pluralistic survey of the authorship question is John Michell's Who Wrote Shakespeare? ( London: Thames and Hudson, 1996). Michell recounts the major evidence for the various candidates in the best possible light for each one. Another good survey, more critical of the works of the anti-Stratfordians, is the chapter on "deviations" in Schoenbaum's Shakespeare's Lives (see below).
History of doubts surrounding the authorship of Shakespeare's works provides a brief chronology and survey of the works in the controversy.
The Shakespeare Resource Center Authorship Debates. Another, shorter, review site of the controversy gives some information on Oxford, Bacon, and Marlowe.

William Shakspere, the actor from Stratford-upon-Avon
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The traditional candidate. Some say a country boy with only a grammar school education could not have written the plays and poems attributed to William Shakespeare. Ben Jonson's dedicatory poem to the First Folio calls William Shakespeare the "Swan of Avon." But the Countess of Pembroke, Sir Philip Sidney's sister, also lived on the Avon, and a 1618 portrait of her shows swans in her lace collar. So what are we to believe?

Links (I consider neutral sites a de facto argument for the actor from Stratford):
William Shakespeare 1564-1616
This is the homepage for the InfoWeb's Shakespeare's Stratford Club based in Stratford-upon-Avon. It contains general information about Shakespeare and Stratford-upon-Avon.
The Case for Shakespeare
An article by Irwin Matus in the October 1991 Atlantic Monthly arguing Shakspeare's claim to be Shakespeare.
The Shakespeare Authorship Page
This site, "dedicated to the proposition that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare," is intended to be an introduction for the nonspecialist, and attempts to expose the problems of the Oxfordian argument. It contains a large number of interesting links, including a critical examination of Oxfordian claims, and a review of This Star of England, among other works.
Who Wrote Shakespeare's Plays?
Professor Steven Dutch of the U. of Wisconsin-Green Bay, has this site linked from his Pseudoscience page. He points out some of the absurdities of the Baconian cipher fanatics.
The Ghost's Vocabulary
Another article from the October 1991 Atlantic. Edward Dolnick surveys several attempts to answer the authorship question via computer, and one apparent success which shows Shakspere wrote Shakespeare.
Shakespeare Resources on the Web
Just like it sounds.
Shakespeare Globe USA
Provides information about Shakespeare Globe USA and the International Globe Centre, as well as a guide to links about Shakespeare on the Web.
Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet
"This site attempts two things: To be a complete annotated guide to the scholarly Shakespeare resources available on Internet. To present new Shakespeare material unavailable elsewhere on the Internet."
The Shakespeare Resource Center
Created by a graduate student to provide Web information on Shakespeare.

Further reading:
---Chambers, E.K. William Shakespeare: a Study of Facts and Problems. 2 vol. Oxford: Clarendon, 1930.
Has information on Shakespeare's origins, his theater company, and the Elizabethan stage, as well as historical documents with the author's annotations. This is a major 20c. work of Shakespeare scholarship.
---Gibson, H.N. The Shakespeare Claimants. London: Metheun, 1962.
Analyzes the arguments for Bacon, Oxford, Derby, and Marlowe, and finds none of the cases convincing.
---Robertson, J.M. The Baconian Heresy: a Confutation. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1913.
An anti-Baconian book that tries to refute the Baconian position that Shakespeare must have been a lawyer, among other arguments.
---Rowse, A.L. William Shakespeare: a biography. New York: Harper & Row, 1963.
Famous for its boasts, this book asserts the Earl of Southhampton is the young man of the sonnets, and Marlowe is the rival poet. A later biography by Rowse reports Shakespeare's thoughts as he lay dying.
---Schoenbaum, Samuel. Shakespeare's Lives. Oxford: Oxford U. Press, 1970. New edition 1991.
Presents the evidence for the life of Shakespeare, and reviews various Shakespeare biographies from the 17c. to the present, including those of the anti-Stratfordians. A standard account of the various attempts at biography.
---Schoenbaum, Samuel. William Shakespeare: a Documentary Life. Oxford: Oxford U. Press, 1975.
Focuses on the facts of Shakespeare's life, and contains facsimiles of Shakespearean documents. Along with its abridgment, A Compact Documentary Life, a standard and reliable biography.

Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford
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The current favorite rival. Oxford was a brilliant, well-educated aristocrat with a penchant for poetry, and one of his crests shows a lion shaking a broken spear. Also, the current Lord Burford, a descendant of Oxford, would really like him to be the true author of Shakespeare's works. Sigmund Freud, completely convinced by Looney, believed Oxford was Shakespeare.

Links:
Shakespeare Fellowship
A group arguing for Oxford as the Bard.
Shakespeare Oxford Society
Another group arguing for Oxford as the Bard. Numerous links.
The Ever Reader: online journal of the SOS
Their journal. Contains various articles on the Authorship controversy. Probably the most complete of the non-Stratfordian online resources.
The Shakespeare Authorship Sourcebook
A mine of information and sources on the Shakespeare-Oxford debate. Has a link to the following book.
This Star of England, by Dorothy and Charlton Ogburn.
Contains the first 12 of the 86 chapters of this book.
Volker Multhopp's Small Shakespeare Authorship Page
A page arguing for Oxford with some links. Multhopp works in quality management for Poly-Seal, Inc..
The Case for Oxford
An article from the October 1991 Atlantic Monthly by Tom Bethell arguing the Oxford case.
Shakespeare Authorship Sourcebook
Links related to the Oxford Cause
The Shakespeare Mystery
The homepage for a Frontline special debating the authorship question. The Frontline special, among other things, pits A.L. Rowse against Charlton Ogburn Jr., which, frankly, does not inspire much faith in either Shakspere or Oxford as the author of Shakespeare.

Further reading:
---"The Ghost of Shakespeare." Harper's, April 1999, pp. 35-62.
A debate between Oxfordians and Stratfordians, with Harold Bloom among others joining in. The English professors usually fall into the Stratford camp. This shows the currency of the debate in the popular press.
---Looney, J. Thomas. "Shakespeare" Identified. London: C. Palmer, 1920.
The book that began the Oxfordian movement. Based on 9 general features and 9 special characteristics that, supposedly, the author of the Works must possess, Looney decided that only the Earl of Oxford could have been the author of the plays. For some reason, many Stratfordians have ridiculed the author's name.
---Ogburn, Charlton Jr. The Mysterious William Shakespeare. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1984.
The child of Dorothy and Charlton produced this 900 page argument for Oxford that, among other things, focuses on the parallels between the life of Oxford and the Plays of Shakespeare.
---Ogburn, Dorothy and Charlton. This Star of England. New York: Coward-McCann, 1952.
Almost 1300 pages of the Oxford case. Claims Oxford also wrote Marlowe's Edward II, Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, and Lyly's Endymion. Also claims that the Earl of Southhampton was the son of Oxford and Elizabeth I.
---Sobran, Joseph. Alias Shakespeare. New York: Free Press, 1997.
A reporter rehashes the evidence for Oxford.

Sir Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam
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The traditional rival. Bacon excelled as a philosopher, scientist, lawyer, and statesman. He was the author of The New Atlantis, Novum Organum, and, some would say, the works of William Shakespeare. He allegedly wrote the plays and poems while excelling as a philosopher, scientist, lawyer, and statesman, and, according to many of the Baconians, hid his identity behind elaborate ciphers. Mark Twain believed Bacon was Shakespeare.

Links:
The Francis Bacon Society
Brief description of and membership information for the Bacon Society.
Who Wrote the Works?
A Penn Leary essay analyzing ciphers in the Bard.
An Authorship Analysis
A stylistic and content analysis of works by Bacon and Shakespeare to prove the former was the latter.
Sir Francis Bacon's New Advancement of Learning
Dedicated to exploring the work of Bacon, and includes a site summarizing the Baconian case.
Writing's on the wall for Shakespeare
A brief article from the London Evening Standard from January 1992 reporting that a handwriting expert has given new evidence that Bacon may be Shakespeare.
Is Shakespeare Dead, by Mark Twain
Contains several complete works of Twain, including the whole of Is Shakespeare Dead?, in which he argues that Bacon was Shakespeare.

Further reading:
---Donnelly, Ignatius. The Great Cryptogram, 2 vols. London: S. Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1888.
A glorious moment in the Baconian annals. Through what Schoenbaum calls a misunderstanding of Bacon's bilateral cipher, Donnely discovers that Bacon wrote the works of Shakespeare, as well as the works of Montaigne and Marlowe (which would make sense if Marlowe wrote Shakespeare). Donnely also wrote about Atlantis.
---Durning-Lawrence, Sir Edwin. Bacon is Shakespeare. New York: Gay & Hancock, 1910.
Breaks the code of the famous word in Love's Labour's Lost: "honorificabilitudinitatibus," which Bacon created as an anagram of a Latin sentence declaring his authorship of Shakespeare. Apparently did not realize the word dates back at least to 1055 AD.
---Gallup, Elizabeth W. The Bilateral Cypher of Francis Bacon, 2 vols. Detroit: Howard Publishing Co., 1899.
A disciple of Orville Owen applies the bilateral cipher to a facsimile of the First Folio to discover, what else, that Bacon was Shakespeare.
---Leary, Penn.The Second Cryptographic Shakespeare. Omaha, NE: Westchester House, 1990.
Once again, the code of Bacon is "broken."
---Owen, Dr. Orville. Francis Bacon's Cipher Story, 5 vols. Detroit: Howard Publishing Co., 1893-95.
Recounts Owen's "success" in deciphering Bacon's and Shakespeare's works using a special machine to prove Bacon the true author of both. Claims Bacon was the son of the Earl of Leicester and Elizabeth I. Apparently neither the Oxfordians nor the Baconians put much stock in the "Virgin Queen" story.
---Twain, Mark.Is Shakespeare Dead? New York: Harper and Brothers, 1909.
Vigorously argues for Bacon and ridicules the "Stratfordolators" and the "Shakespearoids."

Christopher Marlowe
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Cynics say he was killed in 1593, at the age of 29, before any of Shakespeare's plays had been published; realists say he was a spy who lived on in secrecy scribbling away at Shakespeare's plays. Or is it the other way around? Either way, at least Marlowe--the author of Doctor Faustus, Edward II, and Tamburlaine-- was a professional author and proven playwright

Links:
A Deception in Deptford
A book by Peter Farey arguing that Marlowe was not really killed in Deptford, and that he went on to write Shakespeare's plays. It is not clear what authority Farey has or who he is.
The Story the Sonnets Tell
An advertisment for the Wraight book.
Christopher "James Bond" Marlowe
A summary of the Marlowe Spy story.

Further reading:
---Hoffman, Calvin. The Murder of the Man who was Shakespeare. New York: J. Messner, 1955.
Claims that the murder of Marlowe was a hoax, and that he lived on in disguise writing the plays of Shakespeare. Produces no documentary evidence to support hypothesis, which, in Schoenbaum's words, is "rather a sad showing for nineteen years of steady work."
---Rhys Williams, David. Shakespeare thy Name is Marlowe. New York: Philosophical Library, 1966.
A Hoffman disciple repeats the claims.
---Wraight, Mrs. A.D.The Story the Sonnets Tell. London: Adam Hart, 1994.
Produces stylistic evidence that Marlowe wrote the Sonnets.

William Stanley, the Earl of Derby
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Edmund Spenser's Colin Clouts come home againe addresses a contemporary poet using the name "Aetion," meaning "Man of the Eagle." Aetion is traditionally identified with Shakespeare. The Stanley coat of arms has an eagle on its crest. Q.E.D.

Link:
The URL of Derby
A lengthy, well-written page presenting the arguments of Evans and Titherly (see below) that Derby was Shakespeare, with images of handwriting samples.

Further Reading:
---Evans, A.J. Shakespeare's Magic Circle. London: A. Barker, 1956.
Argues that Derby was a mastermind behind a whole group posing as Shakespeare, including Oxford, Rutland, and Bacon among others.
---LeFranc, Abel. Under the Mask of William Shakespeare. Trans. Cecil Cragg. Braunton, England: Merlin, 1988. A translation of Sous le Masque de "William Shakespeare" Paris: Payot, Imprimerie C. Colin, 1919.
A pioneering Derbyite work in which a renowned French scholar argues that Shakespeare must have had an intimate knowledge of France and the French court. Also introduces the Spenser "Aetion" argument mentioned above.
---Lucas, Richard M. Shakespeare's Vital Secret. Keighley, England: Rydal Press, 1937.
An American disciple of LeFranc continues the campaign, along the way showing the mysterious coincidence between the initials of William Shakespeare and William Stanley.
---Titherley, A.W. Shakespeare's Identity. Winchester, England: Warren and Son, 1952.
An English disciple of LeFrance keeps up the fight.

Roger Manners, the Earl of Rutland
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Between the 1st and 2nd quarto of Hamlet, the author learned a few things about Danish names, Danish geography, and the Danish court at Elsinore. During this period, Rutland was an English ambassador to Denmark, and when he had studied at Padua University in 1596, two of his fellow students were named Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Spooky, isn't it? Maybe Rutland did not write all the plays, but it sure seems like he wrote one of them.

Link:
A Russian debunks the Bard
A Christian Science Monitor article on a Russian author, Ilya Gililov, who published a book arguing that Rutland was Shakespeare. 
The Game of Shakespeare 
Here is Gililov's book, in Russian (or so I've been told).

Further reading:
---Gililov, Ilya. The Shakespeare Game: The Mystery of the Great Phoenix. Trans. by Gennady Bashkov et al.. Agathon Press, 2003
An English translation of Gililov's book on Rutland.
---Porohovshikov, P. S. Shakespeare Unmasked. New York: Savoy, 1940.
Argues that Rutland was Shakespeare because, among other things, his life parallels that of Shakespeare's life as presented through the Plays. For an example, see the introductory note above.
---Sykes, Claud W. Alias William Shakespeare?. London: F. Aldor, 1947.
Has Sherlock Holmes investigate the Shakespeare authorship question, and conclude that Rutland was the real author. When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

please email me with suggestions or questions
last updated
11.8.06