Видео

Nelson Eddy was one of the truly great classical baritones of the 20th century.

de nada!

Evidence or you made it up.

​@Jeffhowardmeade I'm addicted to laughter, so I love reading your comments.

@@joecurran2811 You’ve sunk to plagiarizing insults, and from me, no less. Man, that’s just sad…

He was a published poet. Writing poetry wasn’t considered work. It was something many of the nobility did.

​@@JeffhowardmeadeHe published under his name when he was a minor. Do you think he just stopped poetry as he got older?

@@joecurran2811 He published poetry when he was 23. Do I seriously have to do the math for you?

@@Jeffhowardmeade And then you think he just stopped ver betim? At least we have evidence of Dr Vere writing literature at 23...unlike Will Shaksper of Stratford.

@@joecurran2811 You do? Please present it! All I have is a published work with a claim of authorship by someone who “signed” a printed work E. Oxenford. Shakespeare did that, and on poetry that didn’t suck. You’ve just established that the dedication to Venus and Adonis is evidence of being a poet. Smooth move, Ex-Lax!

Bravo!! Well said!

"The stronger evidence lies for the De Vere case than Stratford man." What is this "stronger evidence"? Are you going to present some or are you just going to tease us? And how do you know that the evidence has *NOT* been "subjected to scholarship standards for research and evidence" and found wanting?

@@Nullifidian 1. Evidence - See Diana Price’s Unorthodox Biography for a complete inventory of the lack of evidence that Stratford man was a writer. See Kevin Gilvary Many Lives of Shakespeare for the listing of bio fiction that is the Stratfordian myth making by academics. 2. de Vere - stronger case… well, he was acknowledged by peers as being a top tier play writer who couldn’t publish under his name. He has a traceable biography. 2-0 De Vere on the easy stuff 😂😂😂 Let’s see something non-posthumous that (a) identifies William Shakspere from Stratford on Avon as the author of the plays…(b) a legible signature that is consistently executed… simple challenge, right? Or, maybe not. 😢 3. Where are the academic reviews that disassemble DeVere as easily as Stratford man? You know of some? 4. That multiple candidates have a stronger demonstrable case to the canon than William Shakspere is evidence of how soft evidence is for him, not how poor the evidence is for others. Basic. Where’s the slam dunk record if Stratford man is so air tight a case? See Tom Wossman’s brief lecture on “teaching the authorship question” for a systematic take down.

@@craigtimmons6907 First off, I'd like to thank you for actually answering the question and sincerely attempting to provide evidence, which is something that many of your confrères don't bother to do. I'm also going to have to break this into two parts. (1 of 2) "1. Evidence - See Diana Price’s Unorthodox Biography for a complete inventory of the lack of evidence that Stratford man was a writer." I've already seen it. Diana Price carves ten categories out of what she believes to be the gaps in the record related to Shakespeare, and deliberately ignores and suppresses the evidence that nevertheless meets her arbitrary criteria, while uncritically accepting everything else from anyone else she can find which appears to hit off her categories. Unfortunately, her approach leads to some obvious questions. First off: who appointed Diana Price the arbiter of what counts as historical evidence? What logical relationship is there between having been an author and being able to jump through Price's arbitrarily erected hoops? Second: What about all of the evidence that fits her categories but is ignored by her entirely? What justification does she have for that? For example, Richard Quiney wrote Shakespeare a letter that is extant, which ought to count as a "record of correspondence". It's not about literature, therefore it doesn't count for her "especially" clause, but she put that clause there because she knew the extant letters of Ben Jonson, Gabriel Harvey, and Edmund Spenser aren't literary either. Jonson was begging to be let out of jail, Harvey was begging for a job, and Spenser was the secretary to two Lords of Ireland and every example of a letter in his handwriting is a consequence of his day job. Third: What about all of the evidence that Diana Price refuses to consider? Title pages/dedication pages, Stationers' Register entries, Revels Account entries, entries in contemporary literary anthologies, and testimony from all of his contemporaries who bothered to comment are not annihilated merely because she won't talk about them. Fourth: Even if all of these other objections can be dealt with, there's also the slight point that an alleged absence of evidence tells you *NOTHING* . It simply does not weigh in the balance. It has no evidentiary value of its own. "See Kevin Gilvary Many Lives of Shakespeare for the listing of bio fiction that is the Stratfordian myth making by academics." If you had a valid argument, you wouldn't have to tell me to see this or that person; you would be able to make the case on the primary documentary evidence. I don't care what Kevin Gilvary thinks of Shakespeare biographies because I don't base my conclusion that Shakespeare was an author on Shakespeare biographies. I base my conclusion on the fact that he's attested as the author on title pages/dedication pages beginning in 1593, that his name is in the Stationers' Register as the author of multiple works of the canon (including the document that created the idea of a Shakespeare canon: the First Folio), that his name appears in the Revels Accounts in association with the plays _The Comedy of Errors_ , _Measure for Measure_ , and _The Merchant of Venice_ , that his name is in contemporary anthologies as an author (e.g., _Englands Helicon_ ), and that every contemporary who bothered to say so affirmed he was an author, including multiple people with established connections to him (theatrical colleagues, playwriting colleagues, family friends, etc.). This part of the record is _abundantly_ documented, so pettifogging over biographers disagreeing about minor and irrelevant details, like what Shakespeare was up to during his so-called "lost years", is neither here nor there. Also, Gilvary has some gall to be talking about "fictional lives" as an Oxfordian when the Oxfordians have invented an entire fictional life for Edward de Vere in order to turn him from what he was, which is a profligate, egotist, and a mediocre court poet, into Shakespeare. They place him where he never was, assert meetings that never happened, and fictionalize his entire biography to find 'parallels' with Shakespeare's texts. That's why they hate Alan H. Nelson's _Monstrous Adversary_ worse than poison: it's the *ONLY* scholarly biography of Edward de Vere ever written and it punctures their fictionalized image of the earl. "2. de Vere - stronger case… well, he was acknowledged by peers as being a top tier play writer who couldn’t publish under his name." There is no reason to assume that _either_ of these things are true. Edward de Vere was never specifically identified as an author of plays nor was it ever established that he was someone who "couldn't publish under his name", and in fact he *DID* publish under his name. His very bad poem prefacing _Cardanus Comforte_ was published with his name on it. He deliberately exploited his patronage of the book to have this poem and a preface inserted, so if there was a ban on his publishing he didn't seem to be aware of it. Several other poems were published in the _Paradise of Dainty Devices_ with his initials. Also, the alleged 'quote' that Oxfordians use to 'establish' that Edward de Vere had to hide his identity is fabricated. They link together two parts of George Puttenham's _The Art of English Poesy_ that are separated by 23 full chapters. This is the quote as they present it: "I know very many notable gentlemen in the Court that have written commendably and suppressed it agayne, or els sufred it to be publisht without their own names to it, of which number the first is that noble Gentleman Edward Earle of Oxford." Sounds decisive, right? Except that everything prior to the final comma comes from chapter 8 and the mention of Edward de Vere only comes in chapter 31. The *ACTUAL* ending to this passage in chapter 8 is "...as it were a discredit for a gentleman, to seeme learned, and to show himselfe amorous of any good Art." De Vere is not mentioned. And the list at chapter 31 continues with "...Thomas Lord of Bukhurst, when he was young, Henry Lord Paget, Sir Philip Sydney, Sir Walter Rawleigh, Master Edward Dyar, Maister Fulke Grevell, Gascon, Britton, Turberville and a great many other learned Gentlemen, whose names I do not omit for envie, but to avoyde tediousnesse, and who have deserved no little commendation." If the Oxfordian interpretation were true, then all of the people who followed Oxford must have also been using pseudonyms, but in fact many of them (Lord Buckhurst, a.k.a. Thomas Sackville, George Turberville, George Gascoigne, etc.) had been published for years or decades under their *OWN NAMES* . Therefore, the Oxfordian interpretation is clearly false. It's also false because even if the section from chapter 8 were taken to apply, for some reason, to Edward de Vere, it does not follow that having suffered to have the work published without his name on it means that he published it under a false name, let alone under the name "William Shakespeare", which wasn't in print *ANYWHERE* by the 1589 publication of _The Art of English Poesy_ . Also in chapter 31, Puttenham speaks of Edward de Vere in the capacity of dramatist: "That for Tragedie, the Lord of Buckhurst, and Maister Edward Ferrys for such doings as I have sene of theirs to deserve the hyest price: Th' Earle of Oxford and Maister Edwardes of her Majesties Chappell for Comedy and Enterlude." Note the way the sentence is constructed. This sentence could mean that Edward de Vere wrote *EITHER* comedies or interludes. And since Richard Edwardes was not known for having written *ANY* interludes, and indeed was only known for one comedy, _Damon and Pithias_ , it would seem to follow that Edward de Vere is being praised not as an author of full-length comedies but as an author of mere interludes, and perhaps no more than one. We know he took part in a shipwreck device - a small skit that was themed around the idea of a shipwreck from which Edward de Vere and other courtiers emerged to present Queen Elizabeth with gifts of jewels - so it's entirely consistent with what Puttenham has written that Edward de Vere's dramatic career consisted of this and no more. We certainly cannot assume that Puttenham knew of de Vere's secret career as Shakespeare, since Shakespeare was not known as an author when his book was published. You *STILL* have to show not only that Edward de Vere chose to write and publish dramas under a false name, but that William Shakespeare was that name. You aren't entitled to grab Shakespeare's works for yourself just because otherwise we'd be forced to conclude that Edward de Vere's dramatic output was lost. The _majority_ of plays written in this era are lost. You might as well say Michael Drayton was Shakespeare on the same basis - and you'd be better off because at least they both came from Warwickshire and spelled and rhymed words in a similar way, whereas de Vere spoke - and wrote, because people spelled things how they sounded to them - with a rustic Essex accent his whole life. Not to mention that Drayton outlived Shakespeare, whereas de Vere died almost a decade before the end of Shakespeare's active career as a playwright. "He has a traceable biography." So what? It doesn't make him a more likely writer just because he has a "traceable biography". This is to be like the drunk man who loses his keys in the dark alley behind the bar, but who insists on looking for them out front under a streetlamp because the light is better there. If anything it just tells against Edward de Vere that much more that we have a complete biography of the man and not a scrap of direct documentary evidence or contemporary testimony whereby it has been established that he wrote the works of Shakespeare. "2-0 De Vere on the easy stuff" The irrelevant stuff, you mean. "Let’s see something non-posthumous that (a) identifies William Shakspere from Stratford on Avon as the author of the plays…"

(Part 2 of 2) Why "non-posthumous"? Do you think that people instantaneously forget every fact about a person on the instant of their death, even if they worked alongside that person for decades? Of course, I know why. Because you're following Diana Price, who *MISREPRESENTED* the work of real historians to establish a wholly imaginary distinction between contemporaneous and posthumous evidence. For example, take this passage from one of Price's authorities, H. B. George: "The sources whence we directly derive our information, whatever the quality of that information may be, are usually divided into those which are, and those which are not contemporary. …‘Historical evidence, like every kind of evidence [quoting Cornewall Lewis] is founded on the testimony of credible witnesses. Unless those witnesses have personal and immediate perception of the facts which they report, unless they saw and heard what they undertake to relate as having happened, their evidence is not entitled to credit. As all original witnesses must be contemporary with the events which they attest, it is a necessary condition for the credibility of a witness that he be a contemporary, though a contemporary is not necessarily a credible witness’" (from _Historical Evidence_ by H. B. George, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909). Therefore, it is not an issue of whether the printed text in which the evidence appears was printed before or after an arbitrary date, but whether the person or persons speaking knew the facts being related from firsthand experience. Therefore, the First Folio, with its statement from John Heminges and Henry Condell that “We have but collected them, and done an office to the dead... without ambition either of self-profit, or fame: only to keep the memory of so worthy a Friend, & Fellow alive, as was our SHAKESPEARE, by the humble offer of his plays....” is a piece of contemporary evidence because the basis of John Heminges and Henry Condell's knowledge is their firsthand familiarity with William Shakespeare as a theatrical colleague. That he was a theatrical colleague can be demonstrated from the same book because the list of the principal actors has his name in it along with theirs. Their names also appear together in two cast lists in the 1616 folio _Works_ by Ben Jonson: _Every Man in his Humour_ and _Sejanus his Fall_ . They were remembered in his will with Richard Burbage and all four were remembered in the will of Augustine Phillips, an actor and business manager who died in 1605. John Heminges also acted as trustee for "William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon in the county of Warwick, gentleman", as he was identified in the legal documents, in the purchase of the Blackfriars gatehouse in 1613. William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon's will bequeaths the gatehouse property to his elder daughter Susanna Hall. And lo and behold, after Shakespeare's death John Heminges and his co-trustee John Jackson are on record transferring the property to Susanna Hall. Or I could point out that in a writ for surety in the case _Addenbrooke v. Shakespeare_ filed in the Borough of Stratford, Shakespeare is identified as "lately of the court of the lord James, now King of England" when the only William Shakespeare with that distinction was the King's Men actor and Groom Extraordinary of the Chamber, William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon. And I haven't even come on to the fact that Shakespeare's status as an armigerous gentleman, referenced in the documents about the sale of the Blackfriars gatehouse and elsewhere, meant that he was entitled to be addressed with the honorifics of Master (abbreviated "Mr." or "M."), so every time you see Shakespeare's name with the honorific you can know that it is *ONLY* William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon who is being referred to, because he was the only William Shakespeare with a coat of arms at the time, inherited through his father, who was granted a coat of arms in 1596 for his work in various civic "offices of honor" (magistrate, justice of the peace, and bailiff). This honorific is applied in certain Stationers' Register entries (e.g., the one from August 1600 where they note the entry of _Much Ado About Nothing_ and _2 Henry IV_ ) and the title pages of the first quarto of _King Lear_ (1608), the First Folio (1623 - and also in the commendatory verses), and the first quarto of _The Two Noble Kinsmen_ (1634), listed as being by "those memorable worthies of their time, Mr. John Fletcher and Mr. William Shakespeare, gentlemen". "(b) a legible signature that is consistently executed… simple challenge, right?" Not necessarily, since it's not a given that you can read secretary hand. If you were unaware that signatures were commonly made in this era in secretary hand, a form of blackletter script that was superseded by Italic hand, the forerunner of our modern cursive, then you really shouldn't be addressing this subject, to be blunt. It's also not apparent why having pretty handwriting is a necessary condition for being a writer. F. Scott Fitzgerald had absolutely appalling handwriting and yet nobody questions his authorship of _The Great Gatsby_ , _Tender is the Night_ , and _The Beautiful and the Damned_ . The chicken-scratch that passes for handwriting on my copy of _Shalimar the Clown_ must lead to the conclusion that Salman Rushdie never wrote a word (and this was signed years before he was brutally stabbed). If there is anything "wrong" with Shakespeare's handwriting (though personally I find it perfectly legible as someone who *CAN* read secretary hand thanks to having first learned how to read books printed in Fraktur, the German blackletter font) there are thousands of possible reasons for that, including writing _entirely too much_ . The condition was called "scriveners' palsy" and it was effectively a kind of permanent writers cramp. Neurosyphilis and the mercury used to treat it could also produce the shakes, as could years of alcoholism. Or perhaps he suffered from some sort of degenerative neurological disorder that was unrelated to these conditions, like Parkinson's. Perhaps he had rheumatoid arthritis. Basically, unless you were there to see whether any of these confounding variables applied, no one's inferences about his handwriting mean anything. I grant that if you wanted a writer with a pretty signature, you couldn't do much better than Edward de Vere. However, it's just a shame about the contents. "3. Where are the academic reviews that disassemble DeVere as easily as Stratford man? You know of some?" Elliott, WEY and Vallenza, RJ. (2004) "Oxford by the numbers: What are the odds that the Earl of Oxford could have written William Shakespeare's poetry and plays?" _Tennessee Law Review_ *72* (1): 323 - 453. That is an actual academic review that "disassembles" de Vere. What I'm not aware of are any that do the same for Shakespeare. Like creationists, the Oxfordians have founded their own pseudo-scholarly magazines (like _The Oxfordian_ ), but they bear the same relation to real academic work in Shakespeare studies as the _Creation Ex Nihlio Technical Journal_ (or whatever it's called these days) bears to _Science_ , _Nature_ , _Cell_ , and _Trends in Ecology and Evolution_ . Most of the Oxfordian arguments are entirely irrelevant to authorship even if they're granted, as indeed yours have been. When it doesn't matter either way, then obviously the arguments cannot remove Shakespeare from his place even if they're true. "4. That multiple candidates have a stronger demonstrable case to the canon than William Shakspere is evidence of how soft evidence is for him, not how poor the evidence is for others. Basic." But they don't. Whose name is it on the title pages and dedication pages? William Shakespeare's (though he shares a co-authorship credit with John Fletcher). Whose name is it in the Stationers' Register? William Shakespeare's (albeit with one entry where he shares credit, again, with John Fletcher). Whose name is in the Master of the Revels accounts as the author of _The Comedy of Errors_ , _The Merchant of Venice_ , and _Measure for Measure_ ? William Shakespeare. Whose name is in contemporary literary anthologies like _Englands Helicon_ as an author of extracts from the canonical works? William Shakespeare. Whom did every contemporary identify as the author of the works, including multiple people who had personal and/or professional connections with the man (his theatrical colleagues John Heminges, Henry Condell, and John Lowin; his playwriting colleagues Ben Jonson, John Webster, and Thomas Heywood; the family friend and stepson of one of the two named overseers of William Shakespeare of Stratford's will, Leonard Digges; etc.)? William Shakespeare. Where is a single so-called "alternative authorship candidate" who has *ANY* primary documentary evidence supporting his or her authorship or who was said by any contemporary who knew them that they were the true author of Shakespeare's works? The evidence is not "stronger" for any "alternative authorship candidate"; the evidence is completely *NONEXISTENT* . And because it's nonexistent, the alternatives simply cancel each other out. They're clearly not being fielded on the basis of any sound evidence or reasoning, but because someone has chosen their "avatar", as it were, and insist against all of the evidence to the contrary - which they must choose to *IGNORE* as their starting point, which is why this discussion never goes anywhere and nothing is ever established, since they rule out the means by which the question might be settled because it isn't in their favor - that they have somehow identified the 'true author' even if they can't provide you any sufficient evidence.

Unless...the actual identity of Shakespeare was an official secret that would get a person severely punished for revealing, e.g. if the real author was a powerful person, perhaps an Earl, whose family wanted to maintain the author's wish to remain anonymous, as the author of the Sonnets seemed to desire and in fact to predict his own defacement: from Sonnet 81 Your name from hence immortal life shall have, Though I, once gone, to all the world must die: The earth can yield me but a common grave, When you entombed in men’s eyes shall lie. from Sonnet 77 My name be buried where my body is, And live no more to shame nor me nor you

@@vetstadiumastroturf5756 Whole lot of ifs! You go ahead and believe it if it makes you happy.

@@vetstadiumastroturf5756 He was a complete wastrel who disappeared from memory the moment the last shovel of dirt was dumped on his grave. His own nephew didn’t even know where he was buried. One Earl paid a fine rather than marry into his family, and another waited until he was freshly dead to do so. Nobody cared up enough to remember him, let alone preserve his memory by treating his poetry as a state secret.