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Reflections of a Conspirator
 Why
do doubts about the authorship of
“Shakespeare of Stratford” persist, in spite of the unanimous
insistence of academic scholars that there is absolutely no room for doubt
— not no how, not no way? As a confirmed doubter, I’ve been
doing research on this question, and here’s
how  the
leading scholars account for the heretics.
The editors of the highfalutin
Arden edition of the Complete Works blame the doubts on a “simple, if
unattractive, social snobbery.” Sylvan Barnet of Tufts University,
editor of the Signet editions of the plays, calls the doubters
“snobs” who believe in a “conspiracy.” Oh my!
Another academic editor, David
Bevington of the University of Chicago, calls the heresy “visibly
conspiratorial and snobbish.” Andrew Dickson, who specialized in
Shakespeare at Cambridge University and reflects the academic consensus,
writes of the doubters’ “rank snobbery” and
“conspiracy theories.” Harvard’s Stephen Greenblatt,
author of a recent bestselling biography of the Stratford gent, speaks of
their “conspiracy theories,” including belief in an
“extraordinary conspiracy” to conceal the real author. Russ
McDonald of the University of North Carolina thinks the trouble is
“conspiracy theories.”
Are you starting to get the idea?
If not, a recent anthology of orthodox essays on Shakespeare calls attention
to the “fierce elitism” of the doubters, and in a single
paragraph mocks their “conspiracy theories,”
“all-powerful conspirators,” “omnipotent
conspirators,” and a “massive conspiracy.”
Stephen Orgel of Stanford, editor
of the new Pelican edition of the Complete Works, says flatly of the heretics,
one and all, “they are snobs.” The late Louis B. Wright of the
Folger Shakespeare Library likewise deplored their “obvious
snobbery.” The late Samuel Schoenbaum, of the Folger, the University
of Maryland, and every other scholarly pinnacle you can think of, spoke not
only of their “snobbery” but of a “pattern of
psychopathology” he had detected in them. Stanley Wells of the
University of Birmingham, today’s leading light in the profession,
thinks the problem, “usually,” is “snobbery,” but
suggests that “mental instability” may also be a factor.
![[Breaker quote for Reflections of a Conspirator: Academic conformity and how to enforce it]](2005breakers/051215.gif) If
I understand these eminent
scholars correctly, dissent about Shakespeare’s authorship is due to
(a) snobbery and (b) conspiracy theories. I hope I’m not putting words
in anyone’s mouth. It also sounds as if the heretics aren’t
taking their medication.
The Shakespeare heretics have
included Henry James; he can be plausibly accused of snobbery, I suppose,
but what about Walt Whitman and Mark Twain? A pair of certified nonsnobs
for sure. In fact, Whitman thought the real author must have been one of
the “wolfish earls” of his time, because the plays were
“nonacceptable to democracy.” Which more or less turns the
charge of snobbery on its head. And by the way, I think I sniff a bit of
academic snobbery here — the unmistakable annoyance of the Ph.D.
when the rabble fail to show him respect he thinks he’s entitled to.
As for conspiracy theories, I
myself can speak with some authority on that, having published my own
writings under various pen names now and then. Using a pen name
doesn’t take a “massive” or “all-powerful”
conspiracy; it just takes a publisher who can keep his mouth shut. Happens
all the time. Indeed, I am conspiring at this very moment, in the sense that
I’m still honoring a few people’s desire for secrecy. And
secrets were far easier to keep in Elizabethan England than they are in the
age of the free press, television, and the Internet.
But the deeper question is this:
Why all the fuss? If the authorship of the Shakespeare works is settled, and
if the only dissenters are a few snobs and cranks, you’d expect the
experts to ignore them with serene confidence in their position. But this is
not at all the case. Why are the experts so jumpy about disagreement?
Because their complacency is
feigned. They know how brittle the orthodox position really is, and they
can’t stamp out skepticism. But by cursing the skeptics, they can at
least maintain internal discipline within their profession. They send the
message to grad students that if they expect to have careers in the
academy, they’d better repeat the party line on Shakespeare —
or they too will be called snobs and conspiracy theorists.
This isn’t a field where
original insights abound. As my quotations illustrate, clichés are the
rule. Academics are herd animals, easy to intimidate, and conformity can be
achieved with a very little social pressure. No need for the rack,
thumbscrew, or red-hot poker when a little name-calling will do the job.
Joseph Sobran |
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| Copyright © 2005 by the
Griffin Internet Syndicate, a division of Griffin Communications This column may not be reprinted in print or Internet publications without express permission of Griffin Internet Syndicate 
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