The Controversial Issues of Shakespeare

【Abstract】 William Shakespeare is the most popular and most widely respected writer in all English literature. However， over the years there have been people who question the very existence of Shakespeare as a person. What they doubt is either about his being or his authorship.

【Key words】The Controversial Issues；Shakespeare

【作者簡介】晏麗（1984-），女，陜西安康人， 漢族，普洱學院外國語學院團總支書記，講師，碩士研究生，研究方向：英美文學及文學理論。

1. Portrait and Memorials

There is no written description of Shakespeares physical appearance and no evidence that he ever commissioned a portrait， though it sought that there was a market for images in his lifetime because of a reference to one in the play Return from Parnassus in which a character says he will get a picture of “sweet Mr. Shakespeare” for his study.

After his death， the Droeshout engraving and the bust above Shakespeares grave were made. “Ben Johnson approved of the former as a good likeness. Within living memory of his death new portraits were also created based on the Chandos portrait， attributed to Shakespeares friend John Taylor”. Since then， many Shakespeare memorials have been created， first in Britain and then elsewhere in the world. From the eighteenth century onward the demand for authentic portraits has produced numerous claims that surviving 17th portraits depict Shakespeare.

Although there was an obituary photograph which is the nearest we have to Shakespeares version of that photograph. The sitter is in his early thirties， the time when Shakespeare bought his fine house and became legally a gentleman. The painter is clearly capable， and the face that emerges is not one of your Tudor puddings. He is handsome， has certain magnetism， wears a rakish ear-ring， and is dressed in costly black. This man has made it， and should go much further. “Bill Bryson begins his search for Shakespeare with the Chandos portrait. At once he arms himself with judiciousness. There is no proof that Shakespeare was the sitter. There is no proof of any of Shakespeares beliefs. ‘Every Shakespeare biography is 5 percent fact and 95 percent conjecture， he quotes a ‘scholar as saying”.

2. Authorship

“Around 150 years after Shakespeares death， doubts began to emerge about the authorship of Shakespeares works”. “Alternative candidates proposed include Francis Bacon， Christopher Marlowe， and Edward de Vere， the Earl of Oxford”.“Although all alternative candidates are almost universally rejected in academic circles， popular interest in the subject， particularly the Oxfordian theory， has continued into the 21st century”.

There is no letter or manuscripts in Shakespeares hand， though we do have six signatures， quavering and ill-written， on legal documents. In Stratford， we have records of baptism， marriage， lawsuits， death， and taxes. Not one gives us a reason to think that Shakespeare was an author. We dont know that he went to school， though he may have attended Stratford Grammar. His daughter Judith signed her name with an X. So did Anne Hathaway， his wife.

It is said that Shakespeare was a litigious businessman， not a playwright. He did go to London， and in one account he first found work minding the horses of theatergoers. Certainly he became an actor， as did his young brother Edmund. Will joined the Chamberlains Men and was paid for Christmas performances at court in 1594. But Wallace was “disappointed”， and reasonably so， as he saw that the Cripple gate lodger did nothing to strengthen the Stratford case.

In the nineteenth century， some considerations encouraged men of letters to believe that the real author had concealed his name. “For many years the preferred candidate was Francis Bacon， but that hypothesis was not fruitful and became encrusted with absurdities： ciphers， buried manuscripts， excavations by moonlight. By the twentieth century the authorship question had become a target of ridicule. Scholars intoned， as though speaking to children： ‘Lets just say Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare！ At an unpropitious moment in 1920， an English schoolmaster named J. Thomas Looney published a book claiming that the real author was Edward de Vere， the 17th Earl of Oxford”.

Serious doubts about the authorship of the Shakespeare canon followed hard thereon——doubts that continue to bewilder and puzzle readers. The past two centuries of quixotic campaigns that so desperately have attempted to establish the man from Stratford as the author of the plays （or even to corroborate his reputation as a writer！） are now leading many scholars to conclude that these would-be discoverers of Shakespeare repeatedly fail——not due to their lack of zeal or skill but because they， like good Dr. Wilmot， are seeking a writer where no writer （or， more accurately， another writer） exists.

Many playwrights published anonymously to shield themselves and their families from persecution. In fact， as Princeton Professor Gerald E. Bentley attests， “the large majority of all English plays before the reign of Elizabeth are anonymous， and even from 1558 to 1590 the authors of most plays are unknown”. Even when the plays of Shakespeare were published， they were published without attribution. In fact， for seven years after the Shakespeare plays began to be printed， they were published without any name at all affixed to them. Not until the end of the sixteenth century——well into the Shakespeare playwrights supposed career and bordering on his “retirement”——did any plays begin to appear in print under the name of “William Shake-speare.” Not even the publishers of his works knew who he was Moreover， if the writer behind the Shakespeare pseudonym were Edward de Vere， he would have been constrained， as the 17th Earl of Oxford， by more than ordinary apprehensions about publishing his poems and plays.

3. Religion and Sexuality

Some other controversies about Shakespeare are his religion and sexuality. “Some scholars claim that members of Shakespeares family were Catholics， at a time when Catholic practice was against the law”.7 Shakespeares mother， Mary Arden， certainly came from a pious Catholic family. “The strongest evidence might be a Catholic statement of faith signed by John Shakespeare， found in 1757 in the rafters of his former house in Henley Street”.“The document is now lost， however， and scholars differ on its authenticity”.“In 1606， Williams daughter Susanna was listed among those who failed to attend Easter communion in Stratford”. “Scholars find evidence both for and against Shakespeares Catholicism in his plays， but the truth may be impossible to prove either way”. “Few details of Shakespeares sexuality are known. At 18， he married the 26-year-old Anne Hathaway， who was pregnant. Susanna， the first of their three children， was born six months later on 26 May 1583”.

4. Love

Shakespeares Sonnets have long baffled the academic Shakespeare scholars， and with good reason. Published under mysterious circumstances in 1609， these 154 intimate love poems clearly refer to real people and situations in the poets life.“They ought to be a gold mine for Shakespeares biographers， who are otherwise forced to work from monotonously opaque baptismal registers and real estate titles that give no hint of the turbulent inner life the Sonnets disclose”.13 But the Sonnets dont fit what we know of William of Stratford， their supposed author. Consequently， frustrated scholars， giving up the attempt to connect them to William， file them under the headings of “poetic fictions” and “literary exercises.” They try， in effect， to declare the Sonnets inadmissible evidence.

At the time the Sonnets were written， probably the early 1590s， William was under thirty and just beginning to prosper， with a long life ahead of him. There is no indication that he was lame. He had no legal training and caused no public scandal； we have no reason to think he was bisexual. He was rising in the world， not falling. If he wrote the works bearing his name， he would have expected immortal fame， not obscurity.

As many scholars now acknowledge， the Sonnets to the youth are homosexual. No common poet would have dared make amorous advances to an earl， but another earl might.

Anyway， William Shakespeare was widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the worlds preeminent dramatist. His reputation still keeps rising today.

References：

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[7]Pritchard，Arnold.Catholic Loyalism in Elizabethan England. （Chapel Hill：University of North Carolina Press，1979：3.

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[11]Wilson，Richard.Secret Shakespeare：Studies in Theatre，Religion and Resistance[M].Manchester：Manchester University Press，2004： 167.

[12]Casey，Charles.Was Shakespeare gay？Sonnet 20 and the politics of pedagogy？[J].College Literature，25（3）.

[13]Evans，G.Blakemore.Commentary，in Shakespeare，William；Evans， G.Blakemore（ed.），The Sonnets[M].Cambridge：Cambridge University Press，1996：132.