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which neither acknowledged for his own, for we hear of no
remonstrance from--whoever "William Shakespeare" was. It is
impossible for me to say why there was no remonstrance.
Suppose that Will merely supplied Bacon's plays, under his own name,
with a slight difference in spelling, to his company. It was as much
his interest, in that case, to protest when Bacon's pen-name was
taken in vain, as if he had spelled his own surname with an A in the
second syllable.
There is another instance which Mr. Greenwood discusses twice. {37a}
In 1599 Jaggard published "The Passionate Pilgrim; W. Shakespeare."
Out of twenty poems, five only were by W. S. In 1612, Jaggard added
two poems by Tom Heywood, retaining W. Shakespeare's name as sole
author. "Heywood protested" in print, "and stated that SHAKESPEARE
was offended, and," says Mr. Greenwood, "very probably he was so; but
as he was, so I conceive, 'a concealed poet,' writing under a nom de
plume, he seems to have only made known his annoyance through the
medium of Heywood."
If so, Heywood knew who the concealed poet was. Turning to pp. 348,
349, we find Mr. Greenwood repeating the same story, with this
addition, that the author of the poems published by Jaggard, "to do
himself right, hath since published them in his own name." That is,
W. Shakespeare has since published under his own name such pieces of
The Passionate Pilgrim as are his own. "The author, I know," adds
Heywood, "was much offended with Mr. Jaggard that (altogether unknown
to him) presumed to make so bold with his name."
Why was the author so slack when Jaggard, in 1599, published W. S.'s
poems with others NOT by W. S.?
How can anyone explain, by any theory? It was as open to him in 1599
as in 1612 to publish his own pieces under his own name, or pen-name.
"Here we observe," says Mr. Greenwood, {38a} "that Heywood does
nothing to identify 'the author with the player.'" This is, we shall
see, the eternal argument. Why should Heywood, speaking of W.
Shakespeare, explain what all the world knew? There was no other W.
Shakespeare (with or without the E and A) but one, the actor, in the
world of letters of Elizabeth and James. Who the author was Heywood
himself has told us, elsewhere: the author was--Will!
But why Shakespeare was so indifferent to the use of his name, or,
when he was moved, acted so mildly, it is not for me or anyone to
explain. We do not know the nature of the circumstances in detail;
we do not know that the poet saw hopes of stopping the sale of the
works falsely attributed to him. I do not even feel certain that he
had not a finger in some of them. Knowing so little, a more soaring
wit than mine might fly to the explanation that "Shakespeare" was the
"nom de plume" of Bacon or his unknown equivalent, and that he
preferred to "let sleeping dogs lie," or, as Mr. Greenwood might
quote the Latin tag, said ne moveas Camarinam.
CHAPTER III: THAT IMPOSSIBLE HE--THE SCHOOLING OF SHAKESPEARE
The banner-cry of the Baconians is the word "Impossible!" It is
impossible that the actor from Stratford (as they think of him, a
bookless, untutored lad, speaking in patois) should have possessed
the wide, deep, and accurate scholarship displayed by the author of
the plays and poems. It is impossible that at the little Free School
of Stratford (if he attended it), he should have gained his wide
knowledge of the literatures of Greece and Rome. To these arguments,
the orthodox Stratfordian is apt to reply, that he finds in the plays
and poems plenty of inaccurate general information on classical
subjects, information in which the whole literature of England then
abounded. He also finds in the plays some knowledge of certain Latin
authors, which cannot be proved to have been translated at the date
when Shakespeare drew on them. How much Latin Shakespeare knew, in
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