The "Johannes Factotum," who could "bumbast out a blank verse," is
taken from Robert Greene's hackneyed attack on an actor-poet, "Shake-
scene," published in 1592. "Poet-Ape that would be thought our
chief," is from an epigram on an actor-poet by Ben Jonson (1601-16?).
If the allusions by Greene and Jonson are to our Will, he, by 1592,
had a literary ambition so towering that he thought his own work in
the new art of dramatic blank verse was equal to that of Marlowe (not
to speak of Wilkins), and Greene reckoned him a dangerous rival to
three of his playwright friends, of whom Marlowe is one, apparently.

If Jonson's "Poet-Ape" be meant for Will, by 1601 Will would fain "be
thought the chief" of contemporary dramatists. His vanity soared far
above George Wilkins! Greene's phrases and Jonson's are dictated by
spite, jealousy, and envy; and from them a true view of the work of
the man whom they envy, the actor-poet, cannot be obtained. We might
as well judge Moliere in the spirit of the author of Elomire
Hypocondre, and of de Vise! The Anti-Willian arguments keep on
appearing, going behind the scenes, and reappearing, like a stage
army. To avoid this phenomenon I reserve what is to be said about
"Shake-scene" and "Poet-Ape" for another place (pp. 138-145 infra).
But I must give the reader a warning. Concerning "William
Shakespeare" as a "nom de plume," or pseudonym, Mr. Greenwood says,
"Some, indeed, would see through it, and roundly accuse the player of
putting forth the works of others as his own. To such he would be a
'Poet-Ape,' or 'an upstart crow' (Shake-scene) 'beautified with the
feathers of other writers.'" {21a}

If this be true, if "some would see through" (Mr. Greenwood,
apparently, means DID "see through") the "nom de plume," the case of
the Anti-Willians is promising. But, in this matter, Mr. Greenwood