What was the authorship debate?

Answer 1

During Shakespeare's life nobody questioned that William Shakespeare wrote his own plays. It was taken for granted that a famous actor would be able to write famous plays, and that the company that owned the plays (The Lord Chamberlains Men) employed the actor / manager / playwright who wrote them.

About two hundred and fifty years after Shakespeare's death, a book about leisure yachting suggested that Shakespeare probably couldn't have written such good plays (J C Hart The Romance of Yachting. 1848).

The argument was that Shakespeare was not Upper Class, and only Upper Class people are clever enough to write really good plays.

The argument appealed to lots of other Upper Class people (for obvious reasons), and soon there were lots of people suggesting various Upper Class folk who might have written Shakespeare's plays for fun, but then put the name William Shakespeare to them - because they didn't want to be identified as the author.

Any Upper Class person would do. So some people said the Earl of Oxford wrote Shakespeare's plays (the Earl of Oxford wrote dreadful poetry, and died before King Lear was composed - but Upper Class folk can write plays even after they are dead). Some people said Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare's plays (Delia Bacon began this theory, even though Francis Bacon didn't even like plays).

There were lots of Upper Class people who wanted an Upper Class person to have written Shakespeare's plays; and they wrote lots of books about it. The scholars didn't bother much with the idea, scholars know that there is no evidence to suggest that Shakespeare's plays were written by anyone else but Shakespeare.

The Authorship Debate is rather like Intelligent Design: there is no evidence in favour, and lots of evidence against - but people know what they want to believe, and are happy to ignore the facts - or even tell lies - in defence of their case.

The Authorship Debate has become popular again lately because to the film Anonymous, which suggests that the dead and not especially intelligent Earl of Oxford wrote Shakespeare's plays. In the film Anonymous, there is even a suggestion that the Earl of Oxford may have collaborated with Christopher Marlowe - who was also dead. Shakespeare's plays were written by two dead guys working together!

There is no Authorship Debate. There is a bunch of seriously snobby guys who really don't like the idea that Shakespeare was an ordinary guy with a basic education; they want Shakespeare to be Upper Class (like they are).

Sadly, being dumb has never stopped anyone from being accepted as a prophet. Think Ted Haggard.