Loved this. Thank you for so eloquently sticking up for the Bard. 🙏 I was in the audience at Writers Summit, you might have heard my chin hitting the chair in front when the £20k figure was mentioned..!
Yes, our George knew ‘his’ onions. As well as translating Latin and Italian, ‘he’ knew Spanish. He may have been the first Brit to read ‘Don Quixote’ (1605) before any English translation was available. The protagonist in ‘Miseries’ (1607) declares that he is ‘armed to fight a windmill’. And our George wrote about Lord Hunsdon’s secret bastard children. Our George also had a hand in another feminist play, called ‘Law Tricks’ (1608), about a ‘she-satyre’, called Emilia, who assisted a Countess in her battles with her sea-captain husband.
Compare the above literary facts with these historical facts. Emilia Bassano knew Latin. She had an Italian-speaking father, and a Spanish-speaking grandfather. She bore Lord Hunsdon’s secret bastard child. She was also a friend of Margaret Clifford, Countess of Cumberland, who famously battled with her sea-captain husband in the law courts. Emilia was reading tutor to Margaret’s daughter, Anne Clifford, whose Spanish version of Don Quixote had pride of place in her library.
Let’s not be naïve - humans lie. You acknowledge that title page accreditation is not always right. Is it ‘pure conjecture’ to think that our George was hiding something, as did other Georges in history: - like George Elliot and George Sands? The basic logic of Occam’s Razor says that Emilia's autograph is all over the works of Shakespeare's secret collaborator, 'George Wilkins'.
Thank you for the discussion. I am happy to let this be my last post here, but please consider reading my book for more evidence.
Occam's Razor says Shakespeare and Wilkins wrote Pericles. George Wilkins' father was a poet, and father and son probably wrote the sonnets for Spenser's Amoretti. Wilkins certainly projected himself as an archetypal poor scholar. Wilkins was also EMPLOYED BY THE KING'S MEN. What you say here is simply conjecture. There is no evidence that Emilia Bassano / Lanier had anything to do with Shakespeare, and her published verse shows no similarity at all to his verse. That's the end of it, thank you.
Dear Mark, thank you for pointing out your book, which I was aware of, and which is entirely based upon supposition, coincidence, and unconvincing readings. If you are starting from the position that Shakespeare wasn’t Shakespeare, then you have to alter the entirety of history and literature, and you distort everything out of shape. With best wishes, P
Kind thanks for your reply. Once upon a time Copernicus was a heretic. When some brave #MeToo women revealed various powerful men to be secret abusers of women, the world went peared-shaped only for a few, and 'mankind' had to alter their view of history. When Shakespeare's 'Pericles' collaborator wrote about Lord Hunsdon getting his maid pregnant, and covering up his paternity by forcing her to marry a cuckold (as in the 'Wilkins' feminist play, 'Miseries of Enforced Marriage'), you must ask oneself whether this was written by the misogynistic brothel-owner, George Wilkins, or the very brave feminist and skilled writer, Aemilia Lanyer, writing about her abuse at the hands of Lord Hunsdon as documented by her doctor. No wonder Lanyer identified with the archetypal #MeToo woman, Philomel, who had her tongue cut out to silence her reporting her rape. What men might see as 'unconvincing' 'supposition', women like Picoult and Winkler see as a reality.
Yet more supposition. Lanyer's poem is hardly evidence of great skill - it's full of cliche and tropes. A mere glance at it shows she had nothing to do with Shakespeare. As for the Pericles stuff... again, it's pure speculation, untethered from evidence or reality.
Dear Philip, I still have hope to arouse some scepticism against our current complacency.
1/ Your ‘reality’ supposes that Shakespeare’s feminist play, ‘Pericles’ (1608), to be co-written by the misogynistic Wilkins convicted of many crimes, including kicking ‘a woman on the belly which was great with child’? A source for ‘Pericles’, was Wilkins’ 348-page universal history of civilisation, ‘History of Justine’ (1606), translated from Latin and Italian. That’s pretty good for a crim with no record of education.
2/ Or do you contend that Shakespeare wrote all this play, a ‘supposition’ based upon the attribution on the quarto title pages. This would include the first two acts which, as you say, ‘lack evidence of great skill’?
Is it better to trust either of these formulations, than consider my published evidence for a female feminist writer, Aemilia Bassano Lanyer, who was skilled in Italian and Latin? Is a woman's involvement so frightening?
Scholarly consensus says that Pericles was written by Wilkins and Shakespeare. Wilkins had written a play previously (The Miseries of Enforced Marriage.) He also wrote a prose romance based on Pericles, which rather shows he knew his onions, doesn't it? And yes, someone's name being on the title page is strong evidence that the person so named wrote it. (Not always, as some plays were attributed to Shakespeare that weren't written by him, it's true). Yes it is better to trust the evidence, than to suppose that someone for whom we have zero evidence had a hand in a play simply because you think Wilkins couldn't have written it because he kicked a woman in the belly when she was pregnant? No, it's not frightening to suggest that a woman had a hand in the plays. It's just that you are working with pure conjecture, rather than historical fact.
Me 🤝 Susannah
Midwit Latin
Hah!
Loved this. Thank you for so eloquently sticking up for the Bard. 🙏 I was in the audience at Writers Summit, you might have heard my chin hitting the chair in front when the £20k figure was mentioned..!
Ah, that's nice to hear! Hope your writing is getting on well!
Yes, our George knew ‘his’ onions. As well as translating Latin and Italian, ‘he’ knew Spanish. He may have been the first Brit to read ‘Don Quixote’ (1605) before any English translation was available. The protagonist in ‘Miseries’ (1607) declares that he is ‘armed to fight a windmill’. And our George wrote about Lord Hunsdon’s secret bastard children. Our George also had a hand in another feminist play, called ‘Law Tricks’ (1608), about a ‘she-satyre’, called Emilia, who assisted a Countess in her battles with her sea-captain husband.
Compare the above literary facts with these historical facts. Emilia Bassano knew Latin. She had an Italian-speaking father, and a Spanish-speaking grandfather. She bore Lord Hunsdon’s secret bastard child. She was also a friend of Margaret Clifford, Countess of Cumberland, who famously battled with her sea-captain husband in the law courts. Emilia was reading tutor to Margaret’s daughter, Anne Clifford, whose Spanish version of Don Quixote had pride of place in her library.
Let’s not be naïve - humans lie. You acknowledge that title page accreditation is not always right. Is it ‘pure conjecture’ to think that our George was hiding something, as did other Georges in history: - like George Elliot and George Sands? The basic logic of Occam’s Razor says that Emilia's autograph is all over the works of Shakespeare's secret collaborator, 'George Wilkins'.
Thank you for the discussion. I am happy to let this be my last post here, but please consider reading my book for more evidence.
Occam's Razor says Shakespeare and Wilkins wrote Pericles. George Wilkins' father was a poet, and father and son probably wrote the sonnets for Spenser's Amoretti. Wilkins certainly projected himself as an archetypal poor scholar. Wilkins was also EMPLOYED BY THE KING'S MEN. What you say here is simply conjecture. There is no evidence that Emilia Bassano / Lanier had anything to do with Shakespeare, and her published verse shows no similarity at all to his verse. That's the end of it, thank you.
Dear Philip, both Picoult and Winkler cite my book, 'Aemilia Lanyer as Shakespeare's Co-Author' (Routledge, 2022) as evidence. See https://blog.routledge.com/education-and-training/aemilia-lanyer-as-shakespeares-co-author/ . If you wish to press your case properly, consider reviewing my arguments. Kid regards, Mark
Dear Mark, thank you for pointing out your book, which I was aware of, and which is entirely based upon supposition, coincidence, and unconvincing readings. If you are starting from the position that Shakespeare wasn’t Shakespeare, then you have to alter the entirety of history and literature, and you distort everything out of shape. With best wishes, P
Kind thanks for your reply. Once upon a time Copernicus was a heretic. When some brave #MeToo women revealed various powerful men to be secret abusers of women, the world went peared-shaped only for a few, and 'mankind' had to alter their view of history. When Shakespeare's 'Pericles' collaborator wrote about Lord Hunsdon getting his maid pregnant, and covering up his paternity by forcing her to marry a cuckold (as in the 'Wilkins' feminist play, 'Miseries of Enforced Marriage'), you must ask oneself whether this was written by the misogynistic brothel-owner, George Wilkins, or the very brave feminist and skilled writer, Aemilia Lanyer, writing about her abuse at the hands of Lord Hunsdon as documented by her doctor. No wonder Lanyer identified with the archetypal #MeToo woman, Philomel, who had her tongue cut out to silence her reporting her rape. What men might see as 'unconvincing' 'supposition', women like Picoult and Winkler see as a reality.
Yet more supposition. Lanyer's poem is hardly evidence of great skill - it's full of cliche and tropes. A mere glance at it shows she had nothing to do with Shakespeare. As for the Pericles stuff... again, it's pure speculation, untethered from evidence or reality.
Dear Philip, I still have hope to arouse some scepticism against our current complacency.
1/ Your ‘reality’ supposes that Shakespeare’s feminist play, ‘Pericles’ (1608), to be co-written by the misogynistic Wilkins convicted of many crimes, including kicking ‘a woman on the belly which was great with child’? A source for ‘Pericles’, was Wilkins’ 348-page universal history of civilisation, ‘History of Justine’ (1606), translated from Latin and Italian. That’s pretty good for a crim with no record of education.
2/ Or do you contend that Shakespeare wrote all this play, a ‘supposition’ based upon the attribution on the quarto title pages. This would include the first two acts which, as you say, ‘lack evidence of great skill’?
Is it better to trust either of these formulations, than consider my published evidence for a female feminist writer, Aemilia Bassano Lanyer, who was skilled in Italian and Latin? Is a woman's involvement so frightening?
Kind regards, Mark
Scholarly consensus says that Pericles was written by Wilkins and Shakespeare. Wilkins had written a play previously (The Miseries of Enforced Marriage.) He also wrote a prose romance based on Pericles, which rather shows he knew his onions, doesn't it? And yes, someone's name being on the title page is strong evidence that the person so named wrote it. (Not always, as some plays were attributed to Shakespeare that weren't written by him, it's true). Yes it is better to trust the evidence, than to suppose that someone for whom we have zero evidence had a hand in a play simply because you think Wilkins couldn't have written it because he kicked a woman in the belly when she was pregnant? No, it's not frightening to suggest that a woman had a hand in the plays. It's just that you are working with pure conjecture, rather than historical fact.