Criolla-lanza…

…hey Tony, Vito, Joey.
This guy says Shakespeare was a Protestant Italian.
And this guy says he was a Catholic from England. WTF?

This proposition must be very confusing to members of the mob (ie the Mafia not the RAF). A non-catholic Italian?! A catholic Engl;ishman? The mob of course are used to people’s identities being changed. As well as being involved with conspiracies at the highest and lowest levels of power.

But so far the only mafia interested in Shakespeare is a bunch of doubters, numbering some 1700 names of the living and several prominent deceased dissenters. Out of those 1700 doubters at least a hundred have differing candidates for who did write Shakespeare. So no real agreeement, except to doubt.

One of the biggest bugbears of reading the doubters claims is that there is nothing to link Shakspere of Stratford with the writing of his plays. Read the essential facts here. No frills, no explanations, just the facts!

Yet every last one of them systematically fine-toothcombs the available evidence and refutes it with arguments for their candidate. And twists it to prove my candidate is an illiterate moron hired and employed by the leading Jacobethan Acting company. Always in other words using the Shakspere from Stratford person as the dupe or foil for their particular candidate.

If you are a doubter on the cusp or a Stratfrodian looking to defend your burrow i highly recommend ‘The Shakspere Allusion Book’. This link takes you to a version you can partially read and thankfully the index and introduction are included. Read them and weep for your ‘nobody mentioned Shakespeare as a playwright and poet’ proposition.

Selective, special-pleading alone does not a Shakespeare make. As John Klause makes clear in his ‘Shakespeare, the Earl (Southampton), and the Jesuit (Robert Southwell). ‘Nemo solus satis sapit’ or in English
‘No one is sufficiently wise on one’s own’. His introduction is entitled ‘Biographical Heresy’ and covers the latest scholarship into Shakespeare’s life that is worth pursuing.

The idea that he was a Catholic by association and that his hidden biography belongs to the realm of self-preservation. My conclusion not necessarily that of Klause. This book is not even 2 years old and this is the first i hear of it. ‘Conetested Will’, which arrived in my mailbox today (thanks Ben), is not yet 2 months old and everybody has heard of it.

Something is rotten in the state of biography. And it starts with a C…
(and ends in a Y not another C)

BTW Just what is the added value of another candidate for Shakespeare’s name. Say for argument’s sake it is proven, how do I benefit as a reader of his works?