Shakespeare, Bacon, and the Great Unknown by Andrew Lang
page 43 of 246 (17%)
page 43 of 246 (17%)
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tolerate such strange liberties with time and place, with history,
geography, and common sense. Will Shakspere either did not know what was right, or, more probably, did not care, and supposed, like Fielding in the old anecdote, that the audience "would not find it out." How could a scholar do any of these things? He was as incapable of them as Ben Jonson. Such sins no scholar is inclined to; they have, for him, no temptations. As to Shakspere's schooling, the Baconians point at the current ignorance of Stratford-on-Avon, where many topping burgesses, even aldermen, "made their marks," in place of signing their names to documents. Shakespeare's father, wife, and daughter "made their marks," in place of signing. So did Lady Jane Gordon, daughter of the Earl of Huntly, when she married the cultivated Earl of Bothwell (1566). There is no evidence, from a roll of schoolboys at Stratford Free Grammar School, about 1564-77, that any given boy attended it; for no roll exists. Consequently there is no evidence that Will was a pupil. "In the Appendix to Malone's Life of Shakespeare will be found two Latin letters, written by alumni of Stratford School contemporary with Shakespeare," says Mr. Collins. {48a} But though the writers were Stratford boys contemporary with Shakespeare, in later life his associates, as there is no roll of pupils' names how do we know, the Baconians may ask, that these men were educated at Stratford School? Why not at Winchester, Eton, St. Paul's, or anywhere? Need one reply? |
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