Please see below for giveaway information
Who Killed William Shakespeare? The Murderer, The Motive, The Means
Simon Andrew Stirling
When I first cracked open my copy of Who Killed William
Shakespeare? and gave it my usual pre-reading examination, the exercise
gave time for a flood of memories to wash through my mind: reading the plays in
high school and university, of course, but also how teachers and professors
taught them, what we discussed on the side, the high or low passions, variety
of angles we came from with our comments and questions. It occurred to me that
I, neither anti-Shakespeare nor aficionado, not only know very little about his
life, but also his death. There were no memories of discussions or even
lectures relating to his demise.
With this in mind I went to the Internet to see if I could
learn more about this angle—or, more particularly, to see what exactly everyone
else knew that I didn’t. I was in for a bit of a surprise because nowhere did I
see even any allusions to homicide. I picked up lots of typhoid mentions,
especially connected to the time in which he lived. Other possibilities
included alcoholism, though with the supporting evidence of a “merry meeting”
after which the playwright died, this seems a reach, given the long-term nature
of this disease. Nevertheless, for whatever the condition speculated, many posters
seemed to agree that Shakespeare knew he was seriously ill. Shaky signature,
two wills within weeks of one another, etc.
Elizabethan England is not my chosen era of great study, but
I did know it was a dangerous time in which to live, especially if you were the
wrong religion. Prosecution for the crime of illegal worship was swift and
consequences horrible—simply describing them out loud is painful to the mind.
Therefore I wondered why no one seemed to consider that politics was just as
much a hazard to one’s health as any disease on the rampage. Many are familiar
with the need for Shakespeare to have written to please the queen; a civil war
was looming and religious intolerance was rampant—all elements that continue to
exist in our world today and so even if from a distance, most have some understanding
of it.
To be fair, delving into those murky waters is challenging,
to say the least, and, as Stirling quotes Shakespearean scholar Schoenbaum, “What
we would not give for a single personal letter!” or even “one page of a diary!”
Alas, this is not a luxury available, making the parts and the sum of
Stirling’s research all the more impressive.
Opening with reference to the disappearance of the real
Shakespeare to be replaced by a mythical figure, Stirling shifts to the
personal Shakespeare and various interpretations of his life and legacy. Specifically
he challenges the notion that nothing is known about the playwright and commences
the laying out of his research, which over the course of the book shows how
history was in the process of being re-written when he still lived, in the 18th
century and even today when Shakespeare continues to be celebrated as what the
author refers to as a “trademark.”
But why would anyone need to re-invent who Shakespeare was?
What needed to be covered up? Why would anyone murder him? And how could they
get away with it? While part of the mystery rests within the who,
readers shall not be let down when within the first section a suspect is
revealed—in fact, the book’s blurb provides this information:
He was (indeed)
honest, and of an open and free nature: had an excellent Phantsie; brave
notions, and gentle expressions: wherein he flowed with that facility, that
sometime it was necessary he should be stopped. . .
Like an investigator, Stirling turns to the method of
collecting evidence to prove the means, motive and opportunity; without such,
“knowing” is insufficient to support a successful criminal proceeding. Other
elements are required, however: the presence of reasonable doubt as to the
suspect’s guilt might wash away the strength of those three aspects. In three
sections, titled after these elements, the author explores in great detail avenues
of the crime, including what led to it and subsequent events.
Following an author’s note is the “Preamble: The Apotheosis
of Shakespeare,” designed to provide background information for readers before they
are led into the “Means,” which wastes little time in identifying central
players and their significance to the main events. Scholarly in nature and
non-linear, the narrative’s density may initially have a somewhat disconcerting
affect, though readers may rest assured they will settle quickly into
Stirling’s style: direct and smooth, the book reads like a mystery—a literary
mystery in which clues to stage and governmental politics are contained in the
plays themselves. Personal significance, such as motives and history behind
particular lines are explained in a way so fluid that readers move in and out
of events as if they had personal connections.
The amount of research that went into the book surely must
have been staggering, though Stirling lays it all out in such a way we tend not
to think of it as pieces fitted together. It is as if he has pieced together a
puzzle but we cannot see the lines; rather there is an image before us so
magnificent, its contours and colors matched so brilliantly it wipes away
understanding or awareness of the labor required to perform the task.
For example, Henry Wallis’s painting, A Sculptor’s Workshop, Stratford-upon-Avon, 1617, exhibited in
1857, provides some interesting insight; the author utilizes, amongst other
knowledge, Greek myth and another painting to show how the artist drops heavy
hints about events that led to an assault and the assailant’s role in
supervising the funerary monument:
The Greek myth recalls
the ‘merry meeting’ [and a] strained epitaph game—the ‘Rhymes’ which, according
to Michael Drayton, who was there, [were made] with Shakespeare[; his opponent
became] angry when he was ‘out-gone’. Hercules had been similarly incapable of
controlling his rage ‘as a hero should’. He attacked the river god. Achelous
turned himself into a snake and then a bull. Hercules wrestled the bull to the
ground and tore off one of its horns, mutilating the river god’s brow.
It is moments such as this, laid out so efficiently, with
such artistry and accessibility that Stirling draws readers’ sustained
attention and focus to what he shows us, and creates a gripping drama that
captures and carries us on to the next scene, and the next, and the next. There
are many familiar names—Catesby (descendant of the first in the “Catte, the
Ratte and Lovell our dogge/rulyth all England under a hogge”), Throckmorton,
Marlowe, Percy, Cobham, to name a few—that weave across time and consciousness,
reminding us of the myriad connections between people and events, within their
own time and others’.
For this reason, I found it helpful about midway through
the book to return to the author’s “Preamble” in order to refresh my own
recollections and re-connect what I was reading with what Stirling had provided
in this first section. This is by no means a shortcoming of any sort on the
book or author’s part, and in fact I found that section very helpful to return
to on occasion to re-capture links I’d lost track of.
There indeed is a great deal to absorb: Elizabethan and
Jacobean politics, much of which (in education) stays hidden behind the curtain
of “golden age” history; family and religious history and tensions; theatre and
its obligations to the Crown; art and literature; government intrusion; family
feuds; crime and punishment—it is as if the writing of the book required an
author who is in part psychologist as well as detective, his forensic talents
extending across all of the above to provide an examination of how this society
affected one man—and all of us.
Though there are several segments I connected to more—including
the portion in which the author examines Wallis’s painting—what I appreciated
most about the book is Stirling’s honest and fair treatment of William
Shakespeare. Popular culture tends to view him as upright and formal, laughing
in disbelief at wooden-jaw caricatures or amazement at his appearance in other
works of literature, acting out such ordinary human behavior as behaving
impulsively or possessing sexuality.
Here we find a man who is real, in a society and era
hostile to who he was, and governed by those who would destroy him. He responds
to many instances in ways we might criticize or copy; discussing the reality of
his person honors him far more than a created image that falsifies the man. Stirling,
too would have it no other way: “During the course of our investigation, a
picture of Will Shakespeare will emerge which differs from the familiar,
squeaky-clean image of the Bard.
There will be no sweeping of vital evidence under the
carpet. We owe him that.”
If you are a Shakespeare “fan” or not, familiar but not well-versed, lover of history or plainly inquisitive—and for many other reasons, this book is for you. It is a smooth read that will persuade your curiosity out into the open, sharpen the senses and bring into the light some painful truths about our own histories. As the author writes, the truth we owe Shakespeare must be brought out of hiding, as does that we owe to our children.
Simon Andrew Stirling is also the author of The King Arthur Conspiracy: How a Scottish Prince Became a Mythical Hero, and may be found at Art & Will.
Simon Stirling has so graciously offered a free copy of Who Killed William Shakespeare? for a lucky winner. To enter, simply comment below or at this entry's matching Facebook thread.
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