The Shakespeare Authorship Debate Revisited

Abstract

Who wrote Shakespeare? And does it matter? Since Delia Bacon's researches in the mid-nineteenth century, writers have questioned whether Shakespeare of Stratford really did write the works attributed to him, and proposed numerous alternative authors including Francis Bacon, the Earl of Oxford and Christopher Marlowe. This article does not endorse this scepticism, but instead treats the sceptical phenomenon as a wayward contribution to Shakespearean studies, discussing the history and methodology of these anti-Stratfordian claims, to assess their hold on generations of interested amateurs including Henry James, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Sigmund Freud. The authorship debate is conceptualised according to different paradigms: as a conspiracy theory, as a reaction against the growing professionalisation of literary studies within universities, and as a version of the child's wish for more glamorous parents, theorised by Freud in ‘Family Romances’. Its ideological force – both socially conservative – a nobleman must have written the plays – and hermeneutically radical – their messages are potentially dangerous so require the utmost secrecy – is discussed. Finally I relate the authorship debate to recent critical analyses of Shakespearean collaborations with other authors, and suggest that this is the direction in which its probing energies might most usefully be taken in future.