SHAKESPEARE is my Homeboy

Book Review: Shakespeare: Who was He?

Whalen. Richard F. Shakespeare: Who was He? The Oxford Challenge to the Bard of Avon. Westport: Praegar Publishers, 1994.

"Report me and my cause aright to the unsatisfied...tell my story." ( Hamlet V, ii, 338-348)

The quote above is taken from the intriguing last words of Shakespeare's most well known tragic hero, Hamlet, to his beloved friend, Horatio. If we are to believe Whalen, and other Oxfordians in the Shakespeare authorship debate, these last dying words of Hamlet may be a clue, a code perhaps pointing to the secret identity of the "real" William Shakespeare in the authorship debate. This may, in fact, be a puzzle to rival Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code. Or perhaps, like Brown's Code, this mystery may be a masterful work of fiction which has been invented to help sell books.

The Shakespeare authorship debate has been brewing for centuries. Yet, it has only been in the last fifty years that Edward De Vere, the Earl of Oxford, has become one of the leading possible candidates for the real author. The Scholarly community has become divided into two camps - the "Stratfordians" who argue for the man from Stratford (William Shakespeare) was the true author, and the "Oxfordians" who argue for the Earl of Oxford, Edward De Vere. There is no conclusive evidence to prove the Oxford theory. Likewise, given the lack of historical and documentary evidence, there are many "unsatisfied" Stratfordians.

Author Richard Whalen has created a powerful and convincing argument for the Oxfordians. Rather than provide answers or evidence, Whalen raises enough questions about the true identity of Shakespeare to make most honest scholars skeptical. Whalen's book is clearly laid out, and easy to read. He lays out his arguments for the historical man from Stratford (whom he refers to as Will Shakspeare) and the Earl of Oxford as if its a political campaign, rather than a scholarly argument. He titles Part I: "The Incumbent: The Man from Stratford" while Part II is dedicated to "The Leading Challenger: The Earl of Oxford." Whalen presents a fair and balanced argument for each "candidate". Whalen explores the authorship debate for both men based on the historical and biographical evidence.

One of the more cumbersome aspects of the book is Whalen's attempt to separate the author from the historical man from Stratford. Whalen refers to the playwright as "Shakespeare" while the man from Stratford is referred to throughout the book as Will Shakspeare, based on his signature on certain legal documents. Whalen uses the signature evidence as proof that there were two separate identities. According to official records, (which Walen includes for the reader to examine) the man from Stratford always signed his name without the middle "e" (i.e. Shakspeare), while all of the published plays and sonnets were written under the name "Shakespeare." This seems a tenuous argument at best, but interesting nonetheless.

One of my biggest criticisms of Whalen's book is the lack of sources and evidence for some of his crucial arguments. For example, regarding the signature debate. Whalen points out, "About half the time the name Shake-speare was written with a hyphen" (32). He further goes on to argue "for Elizabethans, a hyphenated name generally, if not always, meant that it was a made-up name or pseudonym" (32). This would be strong evidence for the Earl of Oxford authorship, since it was socially unacceptable and out of custom in the Renaissance for aristocrats to work in theatre. Yet, Whalen produces no evidence, footnotes or historical evidence to support his argument, leaving me skeptical to accept his argument.

Yet, Whalen is successful in raising many biographical parallels, which seem to parallel themes and characters in the work of William Shakespeare. He raises many questions in the Shakespeare authorship debate, worthy of further consideration, including:

• Why was there seven years of silence after Shakespeare's death, with no written or government acknowledgement of his contributions to theatre and playwriting?
• How could Shakespeare have written so much about nobility, the law, etc given his modest upbringing and education outside of London?
• Why is there is no historical evidence before, during, or after his career in London to connect William Shakespeare to a career as a playwright?

Ultimately, Whalen's book provides more questions than it does answers. While the Oxfordian debate has been widely dismissed by distinguished academics such as Stephen Greenblatt, Anne Barton and Harold Bloom, I believe that the Oxford debate is worthy of much further academic discussion. Based on reading Whalen's book, there are ideas and arguments in the authorship debate which cannot be ignored.