Talk:Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship/Archive 2

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The name of the man from Stratford-upon-Avon?

Since, as far as I understand it, the man from Stratford-upon-Avon's name was not — nor did he call himself — "William Shakespeare," and since his name was instead Will Shaksper (or perhaps occasionally Shaxsper/Shagsper/Shakspere), why are we calling him "William Shakespeare"? It seems that both the first and the last name are not accurate. Softlavender (talk) 09:37, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

________

From the authorship article:

"Shakspere" vs. "Shakespeare"

There was no standardised spelling in Elizabethan England, and throughout his lifetime Shakespeare of Stratford's name was spelled in many different ways, including "Shakespeare". Anti-Stratfordians conventionally refer to the man from Stratford as "Shakspere" (the name recorded at his baptism) or "Shaksper" to distinguish him from the author "Shakespeare" or "Shake-speare" (the spellings that appear on the publications), who they claim has a different identity. They point out that most references to the man from Stratford in legal documents usually spell the first syllable of his name with only four letters, "Shak-" or sometimes "Shag-" or "Shax-", whereas the dramatist's name is consistently rendered with a long "a" as in "Shake". Stratfordians reject this convention, believing it implies that the Stratford man spelled his name differently from the name appearing on the publications. Because the "Shakspere" convention is controversial, this article uses the name "Shakespeare" throughout. Smatprt (talk) 16:21, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

______________

I don't see any non-partisan, unbiased, viewable confirmation in those citations. The first citation is unclickable, and the second is quite partisan and also not backed up by anything. Here's another link (also partisan, but in an Anti-Stratfordian slant) that details the known verifiable signatures of the Stratford man:

Shakespeare’s signatures: Shaksper’s six authentic signatures are subscribed to the following documents:

• His deposition in a lawsuit brought by Stephen Bellott against his father-in-law Christopher Montjoy, a Huguenot tire-maker, of Silver-street, near Wood-street in the city of London, with whom Shaksper lodged about the year 1604; dated May 11, 1612. (Discovered by Dr. C. W. Wallace in the Public Record Office).
• Conveyance of a house in Blackfriars, London, purchased by Shaksper March 10, 1613. (Now in the Guildhall Library).
• Mortgage-deed of the same property; March 11, 1613. (Now in the British Museum).
• 5. 6. Shaksper’s Will & Testament, written on three sheets of paper, with his signature at the foot of each one; executed March 25, 1616. (Now in Somerset House).

The six signatures, one of them prefaced by the words “By me”, present a meagre total of fourteen words. The actual signatures are to be read thus:

• Willm Shakp
• William Shaksper
• Wm Shakspe
• William Shakspere
• Willm Shakspere
• By me William Shakspeare

That's all from this link I came across: [1] (Plus, my understanding is that the surname on the will [the last of the six] is not even in the man's hand, but in someone else's.) It would be very nice to have some unbiased, non-partisan, disinterested scholarship that explored this subject — that is, the Stratford man's actual name and signature before the alleged pseudonym came into being (so that the pseudonym's influence is avoided). I really don't know why everyon, we has to take sides when researching. I mean, facts are facts. Even the assertion that name spellings were fluid [that may have been the case when spelling someone else's name, but people spelled their own names consistently] and that "Shak" could be and was pronounced "Shake" consistently comes only from one stand-point and not the other, it seems. Whatever happened to pure research, uninfluenced by viewpoints? *sigh* Softlavender (talk) 10:08, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

As a matter of respect, we should try to call the man by the name he used himself. Taking away what appear to be abbreviations, both of his first and last names, that gives us "William Shakspere". He used this last name twice in six (maybe just five justifiable) signatures; the other forms appearing to be a short form. I'd have to question the last signature, given what's been said about it being in a different hand. He never apparently called himself "Shakespeare", which we do now; certainly not "Shake-speare" which is the way the name originally appears when attached to the works in question.Artaxerxes (talk) 17:21, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

"Shakespeare" was the most common published version, preferred for typesetting reasons. Throughout history different versions of the spelling have been used. It is very common for Victorian authors to spell the name 'Shakespere'; and 'Shakspere' was also used well into the twentieth century. All are referring to both the author and the man. It is not true that "name originally appears when attached to the works in question" in a hypenated form. Sometimes it does. Sometimes it doesn't. The definitive spelling now used is the one that is adopted in the First Folio, which is the same as the first published version [2]. Paul B (talk) 17:33, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

We seem to be dealing with (at least) three major name issues: 1) "Shake-speare", a hyphenated version which appears with original manuscripts, in a form that tended to connote a pen-name in that time. That it was not always used does not take away the importance of its use in this context; 2) what the man to whom the works of "Shakespeare" are regularly attributed called himself (never "Shakespeare", but always some variant). To say people spelled their names in a mix of ways in those days does not directly address the fact that he never took the name (actual spelling) we now apply to him; and, 3) "Shakespeare", the name that has been settled on as applying to the author(s) of the works in question. Naming issues as complex (and confusing) as these would seem to require a dedicated section to help clarify things, which I do not see anywhere in this article. Snatches here-and-there, perhaps, but no properly-organized, dedicated section.Artaxerxes (talk) 17:57, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry, what "original manuscripts" used "Shake-speare"? There are no original manuscripts apart from the signed documents. I guess you refer to the fact that some printed editions use a hyphen. The claim that a hyphen signified a pseudonym is simply false. Many real names were published with hyphens, and as I have already said, it was published without a hyphen in the First Folio and in the narrative poems, which latter are the only publications that were certainly supervised by the author himself, so that is his preferred published version of the name (even if it was only preferred for typesetting reasons). If we were to "respect" an author's handwritten spelling of a names we would call Marlowe "Marley". Anne Hathaway's tomb calls her the "wife of William Shakespeare", but his own tomb right next to it has "Shakspeare". These are just unimportant variations, unless you believe that Anne was married to the Earl of Oxford! There is plenty of evidence that the man from Stratford's name was regularly spelled both ways, but to use a specifically different spelling would be to implicitly endorse Oxfordian claims. Paul B (talk) 18:12, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the correction on "manuscripts". I knew this was a dangerous term to use, I just didn't know the better one to apply in the moment (just putting it in quotes might have helped). Your further comments only further support the need for a section devoted to the issues of applied names in this case. This would be a good place for you to make your above arguments, properly attributed. But, in an encyclopedic article dedicated to chasing down the facts in a case of literary history (and mystery for many), an explanation at least is needed to explain why historians, educators, publishers, researchers, etc. would go from a man's taken name of "Shakspere" to "Shakespeare" (hyphen removed)—especially when the latter term comes separately as an attribution to the greatest body of literature in the English language. To do so skips over important factual details necessary for establishing, or controverting, theories of attribution. More importantly to the unconvinced, it might appear to be a too-convenient closing of the literary history/mystery loop: what starts out as a pen-name for a hidden author, gets attributed later to a similar-sounding name on a real person, ends up finally conflated as the same thing. This might appear to arise from a biased view of the facts, there being no other logical way to go from "Shakspere" to "Shakespeare".Artaxerxes (talk) 19:09, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

If there is a "mystery" of why authors and publishers go from "Shakspere" to "Shakespeare" - and other variations, it is not a mystery of the kind that Oxfordians imagine. It's a question of why certain spellings are preferred at one time or another by particular writers in the Victorian period or the early 20th century. I'm afraid I have no answer to that question. That's about Victorian culture, not about "authorship" as such. If you want a clear account of the variations in spelling during his own lifetime read this page [3]. It also explains that there is no evidence that hyphenation is linked to pseudonyms. Indeed, if it were, why was it not adopted in most publications? As for whether there should be a discussion of spelling here, that's debatable. These arguments were first put forward by Baconians. They are not specific to Oxfordian theory. If they should go anywhere it should be on the main Shakespeare authorship question page, but since that was recently a featured article, its unlikely to make significant changes in the short term. Paul B (talk) 19:53, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

This is not so much a matter of "Oxfordian" imagination, or any particular group's. This is a matter of providing an encyclopedic treatment of an issue in as fair and even-handed a manner as possible, carefully presenting the facts of the case without closing off discussion in one direction or another. Then, whoever it may be who encounters this article, and considers the facts therein contained, may come to his own conclusions—or set off on new avenues of exploration as a result. The deflection of critical issues related to an author's name to "Victorian culture" is an interesting one, same as for saying this is one group's interest over another's. (I will say that I myself have seen published books of "Shakespeare's" works in used bookstores or in libraries attributed to "Shakspere" making me wonder what has happened since and why.) The deflection that the discussion of an author's real name and what has been attributed to him should have gone on another page and maybe won't yet (for other reasons) fails to impress, also. "What's in a name?" as the Bard himself might ask. In this case perhaps everything. The numerous related issues need to be put forth directly, likely as the very first section, as without such a carefully presented discussion only confusion can follow. That you yourself "have no answer to" the question of how we went from "Shakspere" to "Shakespeare" has not much bearing on the discussion. The point is that without a logical explanation for making this jump, it leaves open the very real possibility that it was as I have outlined: pen-name made real by forcing it on to somebody who never called himself that for the purpose of closing off the discussion. (Sending me to an anti-Oxfordian "discussion" without telling me that's what it was does not strengthen your case much.) Whether you or others don't believe hyphens connote pen-names isn't so important: enough people think they might. For me it's more interesting that "Shake-speare" or "Shakespeare" is a sentence made up of a verb and noun (not having investigated how they might have spelled the latter then). Much has been made of how this might related to an author's identity; a discussion which certainly needs to be alluded to here. The injection of a hyphen into a man's name is even more strange to me than changing the spelling. What could be the reason for going to all that trouble? It certainly seems to signify something, even if only to emphasis the meaning of the sentence contained in the name.Artaxerxes (talk) 21:26, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

There is in fact a short treatment of the issue at the main SAQ page. Tom Reedy (talk) 21:58, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

If anyone could get motivated, I think it would be worth having an article on the different styles of presentation of the name. Such an article might only briefly mention the authorship issue—its focus should be on the many variations outlined by Paul above with some explanations (I'm assuming appropriate sources would be available). The variations are perplexing to the modern mind, and a brief account would be interesting. Johnuniq (talk) 01:35, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

"This is not so much a matter of "Oxfordian" imagination, or any particular group's". What an odd thing to say. In case you haven't noticed, this is the page for discussing the content of the Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship page. So of course when we discuss what should be on this page it is about that particular group's theories. I get the impression from what you say that you didn't quite understand what I was saying about Victorian culture. What I am saying is that it is very common at that time to spell the name of the author "Shakespear", "Shakspeare" or other variations. This continues into the early 20th century until "Shakespeare" is established as the definitive spelling. I don't know why, say, Coventry Patmore (or his editor) prefers to use the spelling "Shakspere" [4], but it has nothing to do with authorship debates. What I have "no explanation for" is why these variations become popular at certain points in history. It pre-dates the Victorians of course, Alexander Pope spells the name "Shakespear" in his edition, while his rival Lewis Theobald spelled it "Shakespeare" [5]. The explanation of why Shakespeare's name was spelled several different ways in his own day is a great deal easier. There were no rigid rules of spelling. It's not unique to him at all. It's typical of the period. Many authors' names appear in documents and in print in multiple spellings. All this is clearly discussed in the web page I linked to. Shapiro's book Contested Will gives an added reason why an 'e' or hyphen is more common in printed versions (the hyphen is pretty rare). It has to do with stabilising typset text. There is no mystery here. Johnuniq is right. It may be possible to have a page on this general issue if there are sources, though I strongly suspect it may be an under-researched area. The SAQ use of the variations could be a section on that page, which we could link to from here and from other articles. Paul B (talk) 09:41, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

OK, I've started a page on Spelling of Shakespeare's name. Paul B (talk) 11:34, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Doge dodging debate

The oxfordian debate is easy to solve. Whoever wrote the famous bardly works, he was totally in picture about Venice. He had been there, period.

The City of Venice has vast amounts of state and private archives preserved intact, spanning from the first crusade to present day. They were a paper-mill centre for much of the medieval and early modern age and put a good portion of their produce to use themselves. It appears only resolve is needed to dig through such mountains of dusty old papers and find the treasure.

If Edward de Vere stayed in Venice for almost a year as claimed, there must be ample documentation about every single movement of his. The Serenissima Republic was paranoid about all visiting foreigners, the dreaded Council of Ten had many spies just to shadow aliens day and night and kept detailed dossiers on them.

Where is the San Marco Secret Service dossier on EdV? If it was found, the content would probably show that the Merchant, Othello and Romeo and Juliet are (partly) autobiographical, thus solving the Shakes-peare debate once and for all. 87.97.102.134 (talk) 21:38, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

"Whoever wrote the famous bardly works, he was totally in picture about Venice. He had been there, period." Or talked to a sailor who had been there. Or etc. Kaiguy (talk) 07:31, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Very long intro

Why does it need a 6-paragraph intro? Must be longer than nearly every article in the english Wikipedia. Shall we put some of it the main article text? Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 12:48, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Moved the "Swan of Avon" para in the intro down to the Concealed Author section - "Swan of Avon" was not mentioned in the article text, so it cannot be summarised in the introduction, which is usually what the lede section is for. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 12:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Also not sure where the last Lede para, beginning "Authorship researcher Mark Anderson believes "Greene's Groatsworth of Wit" implied Shakespeare of Stratford was being given credit for the work of other writers...." belongs, but it clearly does not belong in the Lede - it is not a summary but a specific point. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 12:55, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Read the article Greene's Groats-Worth of Wit. Greene accuses Shakespeare of ripping off his mates's ideas in his early work. Of course this implies that Shakespeare was the same person who was the author, since if he knew that Shakespeare was a frontman then he couldn't be a plagiarist in the way that Greene means it - unless he meant the hidden author was a plagiarist, in which case the argument negates itself. However, the reference to the Groatsworth is common in these writers, not just Anderson. Paul B (talk) 13:03, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I realise this is an important argument, but it is not elucidated in the main article text, so it clearly it is not written up in summary style in the intro. Part of the detail needs to be in the main text with a summary in the intro text surely. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 13:09, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Part of the problem is that this is not really an Oxfordian argument. It's a generic Shakespeare-wasn't-Shakespeare argument. Much of the difficulty with this page is that most Anti-Strats these days are Oxfordians and they tend to merge general Anti-Strat claims with specifically Oxfordian ones. I think this page should only summarise the generic anti-Strat position. Like the Derbyite, Marlovian and Baconian pages it should concentrate on the specific arguments for Oxford and the history of Oxfordian writings. Paul B (talk) 13:13, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I'm not convinced that any of that last para really belongs in the article if it is to be narrowly an "Oxfordian theory" debate - this particularly applies to the second point in the para about the supposed alterations to the Stratford monument. The latter is not a specifically Oxfordian argument. Any other thoughts welcome, but at the moment, I'm tempted to simply delete the whole para or at least rewrite it into main article text where it alludes to Oxfordianism. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 13:37, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

You are right, that bit certainly does not belong in the lead, because it's not mentioned elsewhere in the article. Please go ahead and move/rewrite it into the main article. I am not sure about deleting entirely, because groatsworth is not mentioned in the main SAQ page, see discussion on Tom Reedys talk.

This article is a mess! For example the long confused bit in italics at the top needs deleting or drastic pruning. Poujeaux (talk) 18:09, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. I suspect Paul is right and the basic problem is where the article strays outside the strictly Oxfordian into general anti-Stratford-man territory. On the italicised bit, that's outside general guidelines for intro sections anyway, so I suppose it should either be written into the intro text or article text. Will have a think about the best way. I suspect someone else may deal better than I with the groatsworth part as I am uncertain how to contextualise it in Oxfordian terms. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 18:59, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

If you wouldn't mind, any arguments you cull as generic anti-Stratfordian arguments please copy them and paste them here in case we want them later. Thanks. Tom Reedy (talk) 22:29, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and PS: You might want to look at the Baconian theory lede for ideas on writing this one. Tom Reedy (talk) 22:32, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

The disclaimer at the beginning should also be moved down and rewritten for NPOV and imprecise diction. Here's a suggested edit:

In this article the term "Shakespeare" refers to the poet and playwright, and the term "Shakespeare of Stratford" refers to William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon to whom the authorship is traditionally credited. Oxfordians such as Charlton Ogburn note that only six signatures survive, all from the last four years of the Stratford native’s life, none of which are spelled "Shakespeare." Ogburn and others use the most common spelling from the signatures, "Shakspere," to disambiguate the man from the author "William Shakespeare." Tom Reedy (talk) 14:27, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

The disclaimer should also be a note, attached to the first use of the word --Errant ^(chat!) 13:55, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

My recent edits

I've tagged the article for NPOV, borrowed quotes about the fringeness from the main SAQ article, chopped out the last subsection which gave undue WP:Weight to Oxfordian apologists over mainstream WP:Reliable sources and have copied over the fringe categories from the main article. All of these changes should make the article reflect policy more closely than the previous version did. There is still plenty of material that needs examination to ensure that the article evaluates sources according to their academic respectability and not their happening to support certain points of view.That disclaimer could do with excision too.--Peter cohen (talk) 23:47, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Biaised contributions

Hello, I've just found out this article, so I'm not particularly pro or anti-oxfordian theory. But seriously, this article is hugely biaised by places, so I edited :

"Oxford was praised as a dramatist and court poet of considerable merit, but none of his plays survives under his name. [citation needed]" -> How could you give a reference for this statement ? Do you want an academic paper saying "we've searched all the books of the library and found nothing" ? I can't understand how you can ask for a proof of the non-existence of something, this is a pure fallacy to me.

"However, since the 1920s, Oxford has been the most popular candidate among those who like to propose authors of the works other than Shakespeare himself." -> No seriously, did a 12 years-old write this ? "among those who like to propose authors other than Shakespeare himself" -> did this person think it's a matter of who-is-right ? Like these pro-oxfordian people are just messing things up for fun ? Seriously, this sentence was totally discrediting this whole article... --89.83.73.89 (talk) 18:47, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree the the use of the word "like" was infelicitous, bnut the citation request was reasonable. It merely asks for a source that says he wrote plays but none are known under his name. It's not asking anyone to prove the non-existence of anything (indeed it is faintly possible that they do exist in some archive as yet unidentified). It's simply asking that the statement be cited. Paul B (talk) 18:59, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Concerning the "popular" bit being discussed: I went to the online reference (EB) and found "strongest" instead of "popular", so changed it to match the reference. I then started reading the rest of the article and did a little clean-up - mostly attributing opinions to the various scholars being cited. Also noted that the history section is woefully inadequate and incomplete. I moved some awkwardly placed information from other parts of the article, but it's just a start. I'm not really sure if the non-oxfordian bits should be there at all. Thoughts? - Anton321 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Anton321 (talk • contribs) 08:27, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Missing archive

I just noticed near the head of this page a red link to an archive. Was there one, and did someone delete it? Moonraker2 (talk) 23:06, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

In March 2010, the article was Oxfordian theory and it was moved to its current title, along with the talk page. However, the archive was not moved. I have just moved the archive, so it will now appear in the archive box. I did not bother to move two other subpages: Talk:Oxfordian theory/GA1, Talk:Oxfordian theory/GA2. Johnuniq (talk) 23:52, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks, that clears up the mystery, and we can now look at the archive. I don't know how anyone would know the subpages exist, but that doesn't seem to matter. Moonraker2 (talk) 01:55, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Multiple authorship

Derek Jacobi, I thought, believed that it may have been a group of authors that ended up under the "Shakespeare" name. I see something to that effect in a related Wikipedia article (maybe the one making parallels in the works), but nothing really laying it out. My search online leads me to an article with the rather circularly-argumented title of "Shakespeare did not write his own plays, claims Sir Derek Jacobi" by Mark Blunden (23 Apr 2009) in the London Evening Standard—with no discussion of his group theory. Anyone have anything more on this theory of multiple authors under the same pen-name? Artaxerxes (talk) 22:47, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I've moved your section to the bottom of the page. New sections go at the bottom, not the top. There are several versions of multiple authorship theories. The earliest versions of SAQ theory were both multiple authorship models. See Joseph C. Hart and Delia Bacon. The History of the Shakespeare authorship question page discuses them in more detail, as does the Derbyite theory page. Of course mainstream scholars also believe that Shakespeare worked with other writers. See Shakespeare's collaborations. Paul B (talk) 10:40, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

proposed move

I propose the article be moved to Oxfordian fringe theory of Shakespeare authorship. This is just to be clear that it is not an established "theory" in the sense of the theory of gravity or theory of relativity, and that the majority of scholars don't even regard it as a viable hypothesis. Gregcaletta (talk) 07:53, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

We don't editorialise in titles. However, we should have uniformity across the four main alternate theories. At the moment we have Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship, Derbyite theory of Shakespeare authorship, Baconian theory and Marlovian theory (and various redirect pages). This article was originally just titled "Oxfordian theory" and was changed last year by Oxfordian editor user:Smatprt with the following edit summary: "moved Oxfordian theory to Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship: several reasons - to avoid any confusion with either Oxford University, or Oxfordian Stage (which is a geological time interval) , and to properly describe what the theory is ab[out]." I fancy there may have been other reasons too, but these are valid arguments. There are several other things that may be described as "Oxfordian". The problem also applies to "Baconian theory", since that term is sometimes used to refer to inductionism or to other aspects of Bacon's thought. The title of the Derby article was created by me as an exact mirror of this one. The problem with the current title is the prominence it gives to the the Oxford-Shakespeare link. I think that's why we should try to get consensus for a common title convention for all four. Paul B (talk) 13:03, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps the four articles could all be merged into Shakespeare authorship question which should probably itself be moved to Shakespeare authorship fringe theories. There is no "question" according to most scholars. Gregcaletta (talk) 05:11, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think they should be merged. The general rules is that separate articles can be created when there is too much material for a single main article. I think that's the case here, but the danger is that this one becomes a POV fork, which is something to be avoided. BTW, there are more than four articles. There is also Prince Tudor theory, and of course articles on various "authorship scholars" such as J. Thomas Looney Charlton Ogburn, Delia Bacon etc. Paul B (talk) 19:20, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Removal of Footnote #87 material in 'Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship'

Recommend the removal of the above referenced sentence in the Oxfordian theory section and its #87 footnote, which informs that the Strachey letter was defended in print after Stritmatter and Kositsky had established the Strachey letter's unlikelihood as a documentary basis for 'The Tempest' and a Stratfordian scholar substantially agreed. The (textually unmentioned) author of the article, Tom Reedy, is not a credentialed professional in the field, the prevailing standard for reference. It indicates that the Wikipedia page permits unqualified authors to be quoted, if they are Stratfordian in point of view. This harms the credibility of the page.Zweigenbaum (talk) 08:03, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

"Tom Reedy, is not a credentialed professional in the field, the prevailing standard for reference." False. Reliability depends on the academic review process and publisher. See WP:RS. Your argument would only be valid if Tom's article were self-published. BTW, S and K did not "establish" any such thing. Their arguments have been rebutted by more than one writer. "This harms the credibility of the page." That's a joke. Most of the footnotes are to books that were self-published or published by people with no expertise whatever. By your argument, Sobran, Anderson, Ogburn et al should all go. Paul B (talk) 10:50, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, that entire section misrepresents not only what my paper was about, but other arguments also. In addition, it teems with OR (such as the Pepys diary material) and POV issues.

As far as "credentialed professional in the field", what does that mean, exactly? The only person I know who has ever been called a professional Oxfordian is Roger Stritmatter. Tom Reedy (talk) 15:07, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

The Pepys reference is wrong. It was the 24th Dec. [6] The context makes ir clear he is referring to a new 'production' as we would now say. I've no idea what this "Elizabethan" marketing is supposed to refer to, even leaving aside the fact that this was Jacobean, not Elizabethan England. Paul B (talk) 20:50, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Anti-strat material should be excised

The material peculiar to the anti-Stratfordian arguments should be excised. The section "Notable silences" and "Ogburn on the signatures" are two such examples. Those arguments should be in the main SAQ article if they are not already (I believe they are), and the anti-Stratfordian stance should be assumed instead of taking space in this article, which should cover pro-Oxfordian arguments only, IMO. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:37, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Neither the endlessly repeated (and preposterous) "man clutching a sack" argument nor the signature argument originated with Ogburn, nor do they have anything especially to do with Oxfordianism (or is it Oxfordism?). However, I think we could have a paragraph or two outlining the history of A-S theories, including the main arguments, just as Looney does. Paul B (talk) 13:50, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Why? Why have an entire article about the SAQ and not take advantage of it with a sentence and a link? Being able to link to other articles is one of the unique advantages of an online encyclopedia. I suggest something like, "Shakespeare's authorship had been questioned since the mid-19th century, but Oxford wasn't put forth as a candidate until blah blah .... Looney used many of the same arguments previous theories had employed to disqualify Shakespeare as the true author." Tom Reedy (talk) 15:03, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Does anyone oppose an experiment an excising everything that is already fully covered on the 17th Earl of Oxford or the Shakespeare Authorship Question page. If no one does, I'll flense it of repetitions.Nishidani (talk) 14:57, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Reply to both - we obviously need this article to be intelligable and coherent, so we have to outline arguments, but I admit I hadn't thought of my own Derbyite theory article, in which I devote no space whatever to outlining generic anti-Strat arguments. Obviously facts about EDV's life have to be included if they are relevant to arguments made on his behalf. Paul B (talk) 16:06, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Well while we're at it that initial "disclaimer" for "convenience", For the purposes of this article the term "Shakespeare" is used to mean the poet .... frames the argument with a POV assumption exactly like the "Shaksper" strategy, and should be deleted. Tom Reedy (talk) 16:35, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Quite.--Peter cohen (talk) 21:25, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

AfD?

I'm wondering whether, despite the views of Our Great Leader, there might be some merit in putting Oxfordian Theory – Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays up at WP:AfD rather than trying to merge it. Then the shortage of WP:RS and the numerous tenuous/tendentious uncited claims could be brought out into the open. Just a thought. Or maybe it would be a hornets' nest? --GuillaumeTell 21:20, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I would support that.--Peter cohen (talk) 21:24, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I disagree. The Oxfordian theory's essential thrust is all on the SAQ page, and that is why this page should be deleted, with the parallel stuff reincorporated back to Oxfordian Theory – Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays, which should be retained. Nearly everything Oxfordians write in terms of theory is pathetically silly, but I admit to a personal fascination with, curiosity over analogies and coincidences, and I see no harm in the many analogies they draw between the plays and Oxford, they certainly contain a lot which Mr Wales would be curious about, though he should be warned that similar lists of striking analogies exist for many other candidates. The aesthetic theory underlying this is that the greatest writer of all time (Oxford) was so drastically devoid of imagination that he could never invent a scene, but had to write something he saw, heard at court, or that happened to him. The Oxfordians fail to see the irony.Nishidani (talk) 21:31, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

It's already been AfDed. I suppose if doing it again is necessary we might as well get started.

Nishidani, are you saying the parallels page should be kept and the main Oxfordian theory article deleted? Tom Reedy (talk) 21:52, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I suspect that the last word of the post is the most important.--Peter cohen (talk) 22:12, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Tom. Oxfordian theory has been comprehensively covered on the SAQ page. There is no 'theory' left to speak of. There are a large body of ostensible analogies, and I think that worth conserving.Nishidani (talk) 06:54, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

If you mean this section of the SAQ page, I'm afraid I have to disagree that the coverage is comprehensive. When I read that, just now, I got the impression from it that the Oxfordian theory may well be a plausible theory, one that could be considered a live option by reasonable people. If that isn't true, and from your ongoing raging against the theory, I gather that it isn't true, then we need not only this article but also the parallels article to explain why.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 04:18, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

The Oxford section at SAQ may be read as suggesting the theory is plausible, but that is because of a desire to avoid bad writing by ladling on rubbish! asides after every assertion. I support the principle that a notable fringe theory should be described in a manner that the argument presented by its proponents can be grasped, without excessive editorial comment. Of course the fringe theory needs to be debunked with clear counter arguments based on reliable sources, and that has been done (e.g. the lead of this article includes "almost unanimously dismissed or ignored by Shakespearean scholars as a fringe theory"). Tom Reedy and Nishidani are the principal authors of the SAQ featured article (with several other valuable contributors), and the above raging probably arises from the frustration of dealing with the many fringe POV pushers who obstructed that work. Johnuniq (talk) 05:00, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

The Oxford theory is absolutely not considered plausible by Shakespeare scholars, or indeed by historians who have researched the life of Oxford himself. Its popularity is in part simply that of all conspiracy theories - an easy way to appear to be superior to so-called experts, but it also satisfies a particular emotional need for some people, who want to fit the plays to the passions and dramas of the author's life. It's clear that some readers simply need to feel that the plays describe some hidden drama in the soul of the author. Most of Oxfordianism is about inventing these links to make the plays autobiographical, so any character that might be considered to resemble a friend or relative of Oxford in some way is deemed to be so. It's a topsy-turvy method of argument - you just look for similarities and you find them. But there is no agreement about them. One Oxfordian says a character is based on x, and another says it's y. The whole thing is arbitrary. The other method is to find coded messages in writings of the time. Many of these have nothing whatever to do with Shakespeare or depend on the outright misrepresentation of the evidence. Marston's Scourge of Villanie is mentioned on this page, a poem that nowhere refers to either Shakespeare or Oxford, but to someone called Mutius (a name meaning "mute"), whose silent name "one letter bounds", which could mean anything, or refer to any number of people in an age when there was no consistency in spelling. In any case, nowhere is any link made to Shakespeare, and its pretty clear from a later reference in the poem that Mutius is a doctor (there's a joke about him killing more people with his medicines than Edward III did in his wars). The flattering reference to Oxford in Bussy d'Ambois also says nothing about Shakespeare, and the passage from Barksted is intentionally misrepresented to yield a meaning quite the opposite of the intended one. This twisting of evidence happens all the time. And half these arguments were just copied from the Baconians, including the Mutius line which originally "obviously" pointed to Bacon. Paul B (talk) 09:17, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

"Shakespeare" is for everyone, not just scholars and self-appointed experts. Jimbo asked whether the Oxfordian theory could be considered a plausible theory, a live option, by reasonable people. The answer is that millions of reasonable people do indeed consider it more than a plausible theory, more than a live option. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 11:18, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

What a load of baloney. You have no evidence that "millions" of people think any such thing. You just made that up. As for the assertion that "Shakespeare is for everyone", that's meaningless. That's like saying "physics is for everyone". It is, or course, but that does not mean that all opinions about Quantum Mechanics are somehow equally valid. Maybe "millions" of people think its plausible to invent Star Trek transporters, but that does not make their views relevant to how we source articles. Millions of people may think anything plausible if they are not experts. That includes you and me. If someone tells me a plausible seeming story about the early history of China I might be inclined to accept it, because I know b-all about the early history of China. Paul B (talk) 11:32, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Well actually if you assume that each signer of the Declaration of Reasonable Doubt represents another thousand believers, then there are millions who consider the SAQ a plausible theory—2,116,000 of them, to be exact, and I'm sure the majority of them are Oxfordians. They have been collecting signatures since April 2007, so if the average U.S. death rate is applied something like 40 of the signers have died in the intervening years. How reasonable those people are, I cannot judge, but I can say that they are vastly outnumbered by those who believe in alien abduction or creation science. Tom Reedy (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

How foolish of me. With inexorable mathematical logic like that, I'm surprised you have become a convert to the cause. Or are you a deep sleeper agent, ready to be activated when the time is ripe? Paul B (talk) 21:19, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Well of course I could be wrong, and each signature could represent twice that number, in which case there would be 4 million anti-Strats on the face of the planet. With numbers like that, I don't see how we can call it a fringe movement much longer. That is, after all, six hundredths of one percent of the population, and probably almost one tenth of one percent of the adult population. But really and truly I think my 1:1000 assumption is very generous. Tom Reedy (talk) 21:38, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Note to Mr Wales.

I'm afraid I have to disagree that the coverage is comprehensive.

• A little background. There is a massive volume of books and articles running into several thousand, 99% not RS, from fringe theorists on this topic, published over a century and a half.
• Most of them dealt with other candidates, particularly Bacon.
• The Oxfordians cannibalize(d) most of these forgotten books, and recycle the material under the name of Oxfordian theory.
• Virtually the whole SAQ article, originally, was written and monopolized by true Oxfordian believers, esp. Smatprt, and was written from an Oxfordian POV. I.e., it approached the whole topic, with its 75 candidates, with an eye attuned to what interests the Oxfordian camp and what the Oxfordian cénacle writes about or thinks interesting.
• So, while we have given four distinct sections to each of the major candidates, the rest of the article essentially draws on arguments from Baconists recycled and appropriated by Oxfordians. What you see in the overview is essentially what Oxfordians say.
• Technically, in historical terms, I think a good argument could be made that the article violates WP:NPOV because its general approach is conditioned by contemporary Oxfordian debates, and the pressure exercised on these pages by their representatives (there is only one Marlovian, and the last time a Baconian turned up, he was a bit of a mischievous sod, mostly here to mess up the Oxfordians)
• Complete neutrality would consist of an article written in historical terms, showing how each particular thesis (the Ape metaphor, Terence, Swan of Avon, frontman, etc.etc) arose, and from which candidate's literature. The frontman thesis is associated with Alden Brooks, whose page Tom, Paul and I took pains to write, but was hijacked without much variation and is recycled as 'Oxfordian'.
• Unfortunately, this cannot be done (or it could be done by several of us familiar with the tradition) because to do it would violate WP:OR. The Baconian theory was comprehensively destroyed in 1913, but scholars mostly ignore it, preferring not to kick a dead horse. The same goes for many other candidate theories. They are essentially exercises, by amateur 'theorists' without any background in tertiary scholarship in resolving cruxes that aren't therem by a rather infantile process of mystery-mongering suspicion over texts that they are incapable of construing even grammatically.
• What you are suggesting, Mr Wales, is that we write out all of the several hundred details of the fringe Oxfordian thesis from what fringe publications argue, and then provide the scholarly perspective on each of these talking points.
• But since scholarship doesn't talk about these several hundred issues, because they ignore them as absurd, or amateurish chitchat by incompetents, there are almost no RS that could be adduced to balance an article based on a complete survey of fringe opinion.
• We have accepted the rules, and applied them rigorously, even making our own work here particularly arduous. Your curiosity wants to know more, but unless you can get the wiki rule book on WP:Fringe, WP:RS, WP:OR rewritten, what you suggest is impracticable on wikipedia. When I showed you that the Oxfordian assertion about Laurence Nowell was simply wrong, you dismissed it as a 'rant.' What you should have said was, 'that is WP:OR', which I had to do because no Elizabethan scholar would waste his time to demonstrate that the Oxfordian assertion was sheer nonsense.
• That you find the Oxfordian case 'plausible' is a compliment to the team of over a dozen wikipedians, but particularly Tom Reedy, whose draftsmanship struggled to be so even-handed in the face of fierce and intractable opposition from Oxfordians, that it actually achieves an impression in readers of making a case plausibly for something which Oxfordians themselves consistently fail to explain reasonably and rationally. Nishidani (talk) 11:46, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Structure

While we may want to a avoid a "he said, she said" appearence of argument throughout, the general rule is that criticism should be incorporated into the text, not left as a separate section or sections, so I think we should try to give the mainstream views within the sections where possible. I cut out the puttenham summary by our epidemiologist because, frankly, I couldn't make head nor tail of it, or work out how it was relevant to the issue at all. We need a representative of the standard view that he is actually saying the opposite of what Oxfordians contend - that Oxford was not concealed, but already made public. Paul B (talk) 18:47, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Here you go. Tom Reedy (talk) 02:24, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Yea, I know. I footnoted it already. I wondered if there were other sources as well. Paul B (talk) 11:38, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I'll add Nelson now.Nishidani (talk) 12:02, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Extreme POV and prejudicial constructions

"Scholars are wary of taking contemporary praise of court poets at face value. Though no plays survives under his name, Oxford was fulsomely lauded as a dramatist and court poet of considerable merit. Oxford's biographer, Alan Nelson, reflects a common academic view in remarking that '(c)ontemporary observers such as Harvey, Webbe, Puttenham and Meres clearly exaggerated Oxford's talent in deference to his rank'."

I know I'm gonna ruffle some feathers here, but I think we all need to take a refresher at fringe theory article school. There is no way that the placement of this statement (and others) can be construed as WP:NPOV. The lede states that Oxfordians reject the apparent historical record contrary to the scholarly consensus, and this section then turns around and rejects their acceptance of the historical record. And I for one want to know who said Nelson's view was common among academics. Nelson? Stratfordians are not immune to mistakes and have also been self-serving by distorting and re-interpreting the record when it was convenient (all in the noble service of fighting the evil anti-Strats, of course), and we need to avoid using those types of rebuttals if we want this article to reflect Wikipedia's highest standards.

Articles about fringe theories such as Oxfordism "should first describe the idea clearly and objectively, then refer the reader to more accepted ideas". I don't think anyone can describe the example quoted above as objective. We should be grinding no one's axe for them; we instead should be "clearly and objectively" describing the topic.

The guidelines also say that the article should "avoid excessive use of point-counterpoint style refutations. It is also best to avoid hiding all disputations in an end criticism section, but instead work for integrated, easy to read, and accurate article prose. It is also best to avoid hiding all disputations in an end criticism section, but instead work for integrated, easy to read, and accurate article prose." I think if we take a page from the SAQ article and present the material in clearly-labeled sections such as "Main arguments of the Oxfordian theory" with the various subheadings and "Case against the Oxfordian theory" (instead of "Stratfordian objections" which title in itself is POV) with the same subheadings would be more in line with policy. The article also needs to be cut down radically; no rule states that every Oxfordian argument must be detailed or rebutted.

The essay "WP:Be neutral in form" touches on some points that might be helpful also. I realise this would be a lot more work, but we have all the time in the world, so even if we only edit one sentence a day Wikipedia standards must be foremost. The most helpful thing we can do right now is to avoid making the work more difficult in the future by inserting obvious policy violations. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:16, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

I plead guilty Tom. I've read so often that praise of nobles in book prefaces was an instrument for securing patronage and support that I glossed it thus. But you're the NPOV boss, and it's your field. Apart from hauling me before some wiki tribunal for indictment for lousy editorializing, you're welcome to rewrite. I don't mind my feathers being ruffled, if the ruffler is a wedge-tailed eagle snapping off my spadger's pinion! I' also waiting for a wrap over the knuckles for using 'fulsome' catachrestically, more or less as Colin Powell used it, to name one solecistic miscreant guilty of semantic distortions.Nishidani (talk) 17:33, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't see anything especially problematic about the sentence you quote, apart from the fact that the criticism precedes the argument criticised. McCrea says the same thing, and I am sure it will be easy to find other scholars who point out that praise of the literary genius of aristocrats and monarchs is about as reliable as the plaudits heaped during his life on the scholarship of Stalin. In any case, even if Oxford were a great poet - as Marlowe is - that would not be any reason to think him Shakespeare. Yes, the title "Stratfordian objections" is wrong, if only because many of them are also Baconian and Marlovian objections! I think the history section provides a resonable overview of the main claims. The Puttenham stuff has to be there because it has become so important in Oxfordianism, though I don't know who initiated it. I do think we need to give detailed refutations of some specific arguments - as I did of the claims about Barksted, but as always, it's very difficult to decide what are important and what unimporant arguments. There is a case for putting all the significant arguments about the "1604 issue" in one section, which I think should include the anti-Oxfordian objections. Paul B (talk) 18:02, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

There is certainly still a great deal that needs to be removed. I've just noticed the following statement proffered as a criticism of the theory: "Mainstream scholarship notes that Oxford lacked a university education:[77] that he was a poor scholar of Latin...[78]." Umm, isn't that actually a standard anti-Strat claim? "Under-educated Will of Stratford could not have written these plays with his small Latin...etc." Since "mainstream scholars" say Will didn't go to Uni and only had a schoolboy grasp of Latin this is a self-defeating argument! Paul B (talk) 19:00, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

What Tom has done is construe, within his grammatical rights, 'Nelson's view' as referring to Puttenham and co., and not to the lead sentence:'Scholars are wary of taking contemporary praise of court poets at face value.' Had I written 'Nelson's view on literary praise of court patrons', the sense intended (this page does not engage my closest attentions) it would have been clearer. As to the commonplace nature of this in Elizabethan scholarship.

• 'the rhetorical cultivation prescribed in courtesy literature by means of which the socially ambitious gain patronage and influence.' Constance Caroline Relihan, Framing Elizabethan fictions: contemporary approaches to early modern narrative prose, Kent State University Press, 1996 p.91

• 'Essex’s reputation in this regard (sonnets) also won praise from musicians who sought his patronage. John Mundy, for example, described the early in 1594 as the tenth Muse, while Thomas Watson lauded him as a potential Apollo.’ (May in his 1980 article mentions this) Paul E. J. Hammer,The polarisation of Elizabethan politics: the political career of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, 1585-1597. Cambridge University Press, 1999 p.318

• 'Spenser’s pension, apparently an explicit case of case patronage for a literary work, certainly rewarded the royal praise and patriotic cultural work’ (of the Fairie Queen) Richard Anthony McCabe (ed.) The Oxford handbook of Edmund Spenser, Oxford University Press, 2010 p.112

• ‘Commentators on patronage poems since have often delighted in stripping back the layers of this denial (of material gain in praise) in order to reveal distorted and flattering representations of patrons by self-interested clients such as Donne.’ Alison V. Scott,Selfish gifts: the politics of exchange and English courtly literature, 1580-1628, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press, 2006 p.175 Nishidani (talk) 19:08, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

As far as I know, Puttenham wasn't seeking patronage, nor was the praise in a dedication or preface.

My thought is that Puttenham, the dedications, the "concealed writer" nonsense, etc. should all be in one section with the tile "Oxford's literary reputation" or something similar. I see nothing wrong in including criticism of the contemporary praise of Oxford's works, but Nelson himself on the page cited (Monstrous Adversary 387) gives a far more balanced criticism of Oxford's literary worth than the sentence I quoted. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:21, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

The sentence I wrote does not refer to the quality of Oxford's poetry, where I follow Nelson, May and others. It served to contextualize the literalist Oxfordian misreading of praise as proof of Oxford's creative eminence, which they prefer not to circumscribe by what we know of the conventions of the period as a commonplace device to secure preferment. Oxford, I have read, figured first because his rank was foremost, not because he was by common repute the best courtly poet.

No. Puttenham was seeking patronage, as the conclusion of his great book confesses in allowing that his purpose itself was to secure the Queen's patronage. The judgements therefore of her court poets play a part in his quest for preferment. See Heinrich F. Plett, Rhetoric and Renaissance culture,Walter de Gruyter, 2004, who, noting Puttenham's avowed motives (which entitles his contemporary readers to contextualize his evaluations), provides the wholly apposite citation from George Gascoyne who, in publishing his verse, admitted he wrote to 'the ende that thereby the vertuous might be incouraged to employ my penne in some exercise which might tende both to my preferment, and to the profite of my Countrey' (p.189)

Actually I agree on all of what you say regarding the reorganization of the page. I even appreciate your challenge to that phrasing. But it was inept, as hurried edits are, rather than an extreme-POV put-down of Oxford, as you seem to have read it. Puttenham was imitated by Meres, both ranked Oxford high, did so in the context of patronage conventions and due obeisance to the court's ranking codes, and these are misread by Oxfordians, who take them at face value. In writing what I wrote I thought I was reflecting precisely Nelson's position. I smoke some pretty weird stuff, Tom, but I thought you'd sworn of James' noxious weed!Nishidani (talk) 20:08, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

I think there are three main components of the Oxfordian argument (rather than generic Anti-Strat stuff).

• There is the 1604 issue. Oxfordians ever since Looney have thought that this is a "plus point". Everyone else thinks the opposite. Both views should be in one section. That includes discussing passages such as the Thorpe dedication to WH, Barksted and any other passages that have been adduced to claim "Shakespeare" was dead after 1604 but before 1616.
• There is the "hidden hint" stuff - various writers supposed to be dropping hints about Oxford and Shakespeare.
• The "parallels" stuff - Oxford's life represented in Hamlet; his lameness and his age referred to in the sonnets etc.

There might be a fourth section, based on the one that is currently called "Biographical evidence" is partly also about alleged parallels between the life and the plays, but also includes some material that would be difficult to fit into that section. Roger le Strit's arguments about the Bible could go in there too. At the moment we have the odd situation that they are criticised but never explained ("there is no significant statistical correlation between the annotations in the Geneva Bible and biblical references in Shakespeare"). Of course this should involve giving more background and detail on mainstream scholarship. For example, the sonnets section as it stands virtually takes it for granted that Southampton is the fair youth. There is only one reference (very recently added) to an alternative candidate and no reference at all to the recent scholarship which argues that the sonnets do not necessarily address a single male object and a single female object. Nor is there any reference to the stylistic evidence that the sonnets were written over many years, some reflecting the language of the late plays. Paul B (talk) 19:45, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, man, I look at the article as it stands and it seems hopelessly disorganized and confused. I wonder if we can come up with some kind of organizational scheme? We've got the main elements, I think: lede, history, Oxfordian case, academic response. How about using a sandbox as we did with the SAQ article? Anybody have suggestions or ideas?

P.S. My main problem right now is time because I'm dealing with a lot of RL matters. Tom Reedy (talk) 15:01, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Grand Tourer Homologated

The amount of "italianation" found in almost half of the "bardian canon" is said to a supporting fact towards oxenfordian authorship, considering the Earl's well-documented youthful Grand Tour across the boot-shaped peninsula. Stratfordians object and argue that W. S. of Stratford-upon-Avon could have written Romeo and Juliet and Shylock and Othello purely based on adriatic hearsay of sailors paid with drinks.

However, considering that bardian plays, including the italianate ones, quickly became famous and W. Shaksper of Stratford is known to have been a rich man in his later years, is it humanly plausible to think the aging Shaksper, no longer having a need to work for food, never took the chance to make the Grand Tour and visit Italy, to see in real life the very stage where he laid his scene so often and lament in retrospect on the faithfullness of what beauty he created on paper?

Even though the aging W. S. of Stratford was still a commoner, he had a coat of arms and a lot of money and knew influential people and a shipborne journey from London to Venice was a rather trivial 2 week business even in that age. If the stratfordian realtor and whatnot never made the pilgrimage to Italy, then we can surely say he wasn't the bard. That and it looks like most official-aligned stratfordian biographies attest W. S. of Stratford-upon-Avon never set foot outside Blighty.

In contrast, there is strong anecdotal trace in Italy, trace of the aging Earle Oxenford's SECOND, undocumented trip to Venezia and his months of staying there. This shows who the real bardian author was, the person who had feelings for his own works (and the famously willing ladyfolk of Venice, who eventually inherited his house there). 84.21.2.137 (talk) 13:33, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes an the blind Homer travelled the Mediterranean, as hundreds of popular books argue, because the Odyssey conveys details about places from Sicily to Italy to the Thracian and Egyptian coasts. And he had been to Troy because the Iliad's excavations, it is argued, correspond to his narrative, even though they were buried under rubble several centuries before he was born. And of course Apollonius of Rhodes had been to the southeastern coasts of the Black Sea, and, why not, Dante had been to Hell, his description is so marvellously close to what we're told to expect, and Lopsang Rampa had been to Lhasa to get his third eye, and Coleridge had been to Xanadu, and Hōlderlin just must have travelled all over Greece and western Turkey - those scenic descriptions in Hyperion are spot on. And de Vere must have been to the West Indies because, well, you know, Caliban, the Tempest, etc. Shlock on, shlock, de Vere and co., I'm sure the Blakean allusion will not be lost on you there.Nishidani (talk) 16:36, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Blake was clearly a Baconian, as his coded references to the learned pig prove beyond doubt. You throw de Vere against the wind... Paul B (talk) 16:46, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Methodology section

I started a new section about the methodology of Oxfordian argument. I think that could be an organizing principle to make sense out of this hodge-podge mess of an article, i.e. the sections organized by method of argument: Biographical, cryptic allusions in literary works, etc. Right now things just spill over. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:28, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I think that's sort-of what I was suggesting above. I also think that we need a lot more mainstream material about the sonnets in particular, and also that non-Oxfordian anti-Strats would contest certain arguments, or say they apply better to their man (or woman). Paul B (talk) 14:58, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I did quite a bit of rearranging to suggest a more logical approach, but the writing is so bad it could easily be edited down to half its length without losing any of the arguments. Hopefully later this week I'll have some time to work on it. The refs need to be standardised also; maybe somebody will pitch in on that someday. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:14, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Critical arguments

Oxfordians complain that Strats don't really explain their case and so consequently don't fairly criticise it. One point I think that needs to be included is what I call the "Italian detail theory", which explains the geographical mistakes Shakespeare made as actually a product of the superior education and first-hand knowledge of Oxford that he gained from his travels. (Mainly posting this here to remind myself.) Tom Reedy (talk) 17:09, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh you mean, only Oxford would have known there really was a seacoast in Bohemia, and only he would have realised that you travel between Italian towns by sea to avoid bandits. Yes, that needs to be put in context. Paul B (talk) 18:02, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, the ones that are for the most part in Shakespeare's sources. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:01, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Reinstating POV tag

The article still does not reflect WP:NPOV because it largely treats Stratfordians and Oxfordian opinions as equal in the to-and-fro debate when policy clearly states that the academic mainstream shoudl be given much more weight than fringe conspiracy theories.--Peter cohen (talk) 01:34, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Please don't forget that this page is a page about the Oxfordian theory; It is not a page about the to-and-fro debate. If you want to read about the debate, there is a separate page for that, and this page should link to it, but the bulk of this page should be an exposition of the Oxfordian theory. The Oxfordian scholars are the mainstream here even if they are not mainstream on any other page. Criticism of the Oxford theory (that is, specifically of the Oxford theory and not of anti-stratford thought in general) should appear here, but it should be confined to its own section near the end. 74.111.185.200 (talk) 23:42, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Proposed merge from Oxfordian Theory – Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays

Said article is a big old POV fork being used to promote the Oxfordian theory. It definitely shouldn't be its own article, but is there anything that's salvageable for this article? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 03:31, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree - it should be merged. Paul B (talk) 16:12, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it should be merged. It was created to reinsert a page that had been deleted because of Inherent violation of WP:NPOV: extreme undue weight given to a fringe theory. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:25, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Merge. It's been so lazily edited that even an obvious link to a major figure was neglected. Poorly written, badly organized, repetitive, and atrociously sourced. I've done a bit of rewriting to flense the blubber, but the whale is still stranded on a forlorn shore, humongous and rather on the nose.Nishidani (talk) 10:47, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Wait, it was deleted before? How was it not G4'd? Anyway, given what seems to be agreement that there should be no article, the question is what, if anything, should be merged. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:13, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I don't think this article should be merged nor deleted. To address some of the points raised above, in some detail, with a view to gaining more knowledge of the questions at hand: 1. I don't see how the article is inherently POV in favor of the Oxfordian theory - indeed, it seems to quite strongly reject it. 2. Like most people, I don't really know anything about this question, although I have heard about it since I was a child. If I want to form my own well-educated judgment about it, I will need to have access to a lot of information. This remains true even if the theory is an extreme fringe theory - in order for me to be able to defend my mind against the theory, I need to be able to understand it - and understanding it, if it is false, will not lead me to believe that it is true. 3. As far as I can see, the article has a lot of information and lots of footnotes. It doesn't seem to be "atrociously sourced" but if it is, then the correct answer to that is to improve the sourcing, not to simply delete it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 23:36, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

The article is not really a list of parallels; it is a list of imaginative cherry-picked details that Oxfordians use to support the idea that the plays are chunks of thinly-disguised biography written by Oxford because there is no evidence whatsoever that Oxford wrote Shakespeare. Most of the "parallels" require exaggerated or flat-out wrong perspectives of Oxford's biography (a classic exercise in confirmation bias), and similar such lists have been shown to be just as valid for other alternative candidates of the nobility, including King James and the 6th Earl of Derby; the only real difference is that Oxford is the most popular candidate at the moment.

The "lot of information" consists of Oxfordian talking points, and it's a bit like having a separate article detailing all the arguments of Moon landing conspiracy theories that gives only one side, in addition to the main article. While there is an article about the Examination of Apollo Moon photographs, each individual point is convincingly and scientifically rebutted, far from the token "While mainstream scholars assert that [this or that Oxfordian claim] is invalid ..." type of NPOV "disclaimer" to try to slide under the WP:UNDUE bar that peppers the "parallels" page.

In short, the article is meant to be a promotional source page for potential Oxfordian recruits. In order to inject some semblance of balance to the article, a list should be included of all the characters and events that don't match Oxford's life as reconstructed in the Oxfordian imagination, as well as a list of the many points of congruity with William Shakespeare's life that appear in the works. While I suppose that is possible, had we but world enough and time, it hardly seems to me the proper use of an encyclopedia to furnish a sanctioned battleground for fringe theorists.

The article's sources cannot be improved, because the sources claiming the "parallels" are all questionable according to Wikipedia standards, nor are the independent or reliable. I've often thought that WP needs to make some provisions so that fringe sources could be used in articles about fringe theories, but that has not yet happened. The fact that they have been and are still used in most anti-Stratfordian articles testifies to the lack of labor and time of WP editors, not to the reliability of the sources. Tom Reedy (talk) 01:21, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

This is a very good summary of the problem. I would also like to reiterate that if it has previously been deleted per a deletion discussion, as is the case, and is currently in a similar form to that deleted, which seems likely, anyone would be at liberty to G4 speedy-delete it, so the question is "delete or merge," not "keep or merge." –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:05, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

There's quite a lot of useful play-by-play material in the Parallels article - it would be very long if it was merged in here as-is. I do think some of the Parallels article material is rather repetitive and not always accurate or well-sourced though. I could point to a number of errors in it from a quick reading - it needs some work! Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 23:50, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Request that we waste another year running down hares sprung from the prodigiously philoprogenitive Oxfordian breeding kennels, Mr Wales?

The Oxfordians are masters in wrapping up everyone's time in an ever-expanding universe of furphies, shabby, quixotic, pseudo-scholastic 'ideas' which feed off the very scholarship that systematically dismantles their every 'talking point'. Since they regard scholarship as a systematic establishmentarian game of covering up 'the truth', nothing one says serves any other purpose than to ratchet up further controversy, since they misinterpret any rebuttal, and generate further mother-lodes of nonsense on the basis of their inability to read, or refusal to understand normal cognitive methods of evidence evaluation. I'll deal with just one issue. You state:-

'If I want to form my own well-educated judgment about it, I will need to have access to a lot of information.'

If you want information, you won't get it from this article.

The Shakespeare Authorship Question took a whole year of intense editing in order to make a neat distinction for the reader between (a) what disinformed people, true-believers and unlettered fundamentalists say or assert or fantasize and (b) what the best Elizabethan-period scholarship says, with regard to the fringe theory.

At least for myself, as one of several editors of the FA article, the operative idea in cleaning up the other mess, was to make a distinction between 'noise' and 'information' in a communicative system. The noise came from poor sources, the information came from the best RS on Elizabethan and, specifically, Shakespearean scholarship. Operationally it was difficult to edit because, as in the game theory of von Neumann:

one team (was) deliberately trying to get ther message across, and another team .. (was) resort(ing) to any strategy to jam the message.' Norbert Wiener, The Human Use of Human Beings, (1950) 1968 p.168.

What you call the 'information' amassed on this page is 'noise': the jerryrigged compilation of 'takes' that add up to the subliminal message 'you, reader, have been had by the academic establishment,' and here at least you can 'decide for yourself' on where 'the truth lies.' In making this elementary confusion between information and disinformation (the insider's dope) you fail to catch what is going on here.

Take 'concealed writer'. We have a whole section on it. But this is not an 'Oxfordian' position, and whoever edited that covered up the theft. It was, like 95% of the pabulum, hijacked from the earlier Baconian theory a century ago, and relies on a single line in one letter, dated 1603, a year before Oxford's death, of Francis Bacon in which he requests of Sir John Davies, who was to meet the king, to put in a good word on his behalf to his majesty: 'desiring you to be good to concealed poets, I continue, yours very assured, Fr. Bacon.'.

No Baconian scholar of standing has ever taken this to mean that (a) Bacon was a poet of great standing as opposed to an occasional versifer, like everyone of his day (b) or that 'concealed' here means 'suppressed'. (c) There is no evidence that De Vere, by extension, was also a 'concealed poet'. The phrase is borrowed from Baconian theory, via Charles Wisner Barrell several decades ago, a Shakespearean amateur who notoriously got everything he touched wrong and is suspected of faking evidence, and artfully confused with the common practice of 'pseudonymous/anonymous' publication, which is another kettle of fish altogether. The blob of information, given in the original, and then, in paraphrase from George Puttenham's own 'anonymous' 1589 treatise about nobles writing only for court entertainment. In Oxfordian lore, Puttenham's passage is conflated with an earlier remark he made:'I know very many notable gentlemen in the Court that have written commendably, And suppressed it again, or else suffered it to be published without their own names to it: as if it were a discredit for a gentleman to seem learned,' where Oxford is not mentioned, nor poetry, nor plays, in order to give the impression the second passage is to be interpreted in terms of the first. The one passage talks of publications by nobles who are 'learned' (treatises, like Puttenham's own), the other of court compositions (for leisurely delectation). Typically, whoever wrote what we have, was too lazy to connect even the dots in the Oxfordian thesis, and left out the key passage in Puttenham's treatise which allows them to read what is quoted as proof Oxford was a 'suppressed/concealed' poet.

How is this sourced (my 'atrocious sourcing' to which, at a glance you take exception)

We have a primary source, an Elizabethan book published before the usual dates for the beginning of Shakespeare's career as a writer. This is glossed by a paraphrase written by the recently deceased Andrew Hannas, an epidemiologist, whom we are told was also a trained classical scholar with a knowledge of Latin. (Oxford Society Website).

One pauses: if one is a trained classical scholar', adding as if it were extra information 'with a knowledge of Latin' is rather like saying in an obituary: 'Einstein was a physicist, with a knowledge of mathematics.' This is the sort of quarter-baked comment one has to deal with in reading these tertiary reports of second-hand glosses on half-baked vanity publications written by journalists and assorted odd-bods who have never troubled themselves to take a degree in the subjects they descant on.

Who was Hannas?

'It was Andy who uncovered that the founding father of Anglo-Saxon studies, Laurence Nowell (not a church official by the same name that previous scholars had mistakenly identified) was Edward de Vere’s tutor in 1563. And noting that in 1563 this same Laurence Nowell signed his name to the Beowulf manuscript, Andy went on to uncover Beowulf’s influence on Hamlet. Phenomenal!' source, the self-tutored Elizabethan expert cum Boston journalist Mark Anderson.

Fact. That Laurence Nowell, de Vere's tutor, and antiquarian Anglo-Saxon scholar, was a distinct person from Laurence Nowell the Dean of Lichfield, was discovered by Retha Warnicke (1974), and further sorted out by Thomas Hahn (1983) and Carl Berkhout (1985). (Source Raymond J. S. Grant Laurence Nowell, William Lambarde, and the laws of the Anglo-Saxons, Rodopi 1996 p.12)

The 'sourcing' you approve of, all breaks down, in at least 60 instances, to something like this. Those who know the subject can see this at a glance. Those curious about the subject will have no idea that this is all Potemkin village stuff, rigged out to give a good impression of palpably incompetent editing.

In short, on this minor point, the sourcing is either primary, or unreliable, as the casual example from an epidemiologist shows, not a reliable source for the construal of Elizabethan treatises. A whole section suppresses a mass of scholarship, which we could supply of course, to contextualize the misrepresentations flourished on the page. An innuendo is seeded, then another. Your position is: 'Hey, don't delete. Fix it' which in plain man's terms says: 'If sloppy editors create and sustain disinformative pages, committed editors should take time off their lives, reading, and wikiwork, to gently engage them, page after page, for several months so that the nonsense is appropriately contextualized according to the scholarship which the incompetent original editors refuse to read or acknowledge or harvest. You would have been more neutral had you simply asked the Oxfordians to adhere to a rigorous reading of policy, get their own act together and, when editing, prove their bona fides by doing the work asked of them, rather than messily pushing a fringe theory and then getting others, who have serious interests, to clean up after them. Nishidani (talk) 11:58, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Wow, that's quite a rant. I'm entirely unpersuaded by it. I'm sorry you seem to be angry at someone, but that's really quite a bit beside the point. We need to have a good, complete, robust set of articles on this topic. If you, despite your clear passion for the subject, don't want to take time off from your life to write it, that's totally fine with me. Just don't stop others from doing it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:31, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Mr Wales. We write articles, and to do so, work comprehensively to review what the best literature says of anything. You're unpersuaded because, obviously, you know as little about the topic as the people who wrote this page. I think it was Bertrand Russell who informed my youth that scholarship without passion was vacuous. It happens to be what drives knowledge, you can find its theoretical justification in Plato, and a modern defense of it in George Steiner. If this is all beyond you, and you prefer the version of grievance given in emails to the passionate exposition of the academic state of the art, then fine. But keep cheap cracks about 'rants', which is lazy man's language for WP:TLDR, i.e. impatience with anything but sound-bites or snippety ad-libbing, out of the conversation. As to the last line, I suggest you withhold using your influence to defend the rights of bad and banned editors from turning the joy of actually writing articles to the best quality standards your protocols urge on us, into a farce of sterile negotiation and influence-peddling.Nishidani (talk) 16:02, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with some of Nishidani's points (especially about the extent to which conspiracy theorists often raise bogus points requiring elaborate knock-downs, only to then resurface them), but I think you (Nishidani) are not being particularly fair to that article, which does go to some lengths to try to provide balanced information and different interpretations, regardless of what one thinks about them. And by the way it makes no mention of Bacon or the "Concealed Poet" line (which I also happen to agree with you and general scholarship on). The issue as always here is how to give coverage of alternate theories without depriving the casual reader of scepticism, scholarship and views about the popular theories - if they are popular enough to have for example a large published literature - as this one does - they are popular enough to cover in WP in that sceptical, informed fashion. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 15:39, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm sure you were as gratified as I was to learn that the names Francisco and Horatio were Italian forms of the names of Oxford's cousins, Horace and Francis. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:38, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Poor Marcellus and Bernardo left out in the (bitter) cold... if this article is kept, I should take a look at it and remove the worst of the nonsense. Laertes a rival at court, indeed, and that fabrication about the Italian cities, among other things. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:05, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, in any one section I've looked at, it would require several hours work just to fix things. Half of the sources are unreliable. The page is full of contentious points without a reference. On a rough calculation I could run up a list, if I had two days, of at least 200 things requiring attention. If you can point to me any instances of where the article 'goes to some lengths to provide balanced information and different interpretations' that would help. The fact that the article has nothing on where the 'concealed poet' meme was taken from is just an instance of how it manages to not provide the order of information Mr Wales might find interesting. It is systematic in not saying the most interesting things RS say of everything from the putative mute swan to computerized analyses of de Vere's poetic style. The guys over there have been told about this, they wobble and worry, and keep mum, hoping that the hard yakka of actually balancing the article will be done by someone, since they'd prefer to read their newsletters, and stick to POV pushing.Nishidani (talk) 16:41, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

"We need to have a good, complete, robust set of articles on this topic." This quote will never die. It will be resurrected again and again in Wikipedia disputes and quoted extensively in the anti-Stratfordian press. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me to see Jimbo added to the Honor Roll of Skeptics shortly, given that they've impressed Charles Dickens, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Leslie Howard into their ranks based on comments much less supportive of anti-Stratfordism than that, because they don't play by the same rules you and I do; they're advocates, not scholars. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:26, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

It's funnier than that. Mr Wales, in writing, 'Just don't stop others from doing it' (i.e., writing 'a good, complete, robust set of articles on this topic) has fingered us, the FA authors, as disruptive hindrances to wikipedia, which now has officially welcomed the the whole Oxfordian team, the permabanned or sanctioned et alii, back to write a complete . .set of articles, more than those invented so far!, and we're put on notice to get out of their way! Wow! Congratulations Roger, SM, Nina. . . Vindication at last! I was called 'angry'. Actually I delight in farces, and it will be a night of smiles in this village, as I laugh myself to sleep.Nishidani (talk) 19:52, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Nishidani, you don't do yourself any good by misrepresenting what I have said and making such outrageous and insulting claims. I did not call anyone a "disruptive hindrance", nor did I "officially welcome" anyone. Your behavior here is clearly out of order. It is precisely the sort of bullying behavior that I have traditionally seen associated with the very sort of people you claim to oppose. You will be wise to examine things in a new light.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 04:10, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Hummm, I do wish Nishidani could avoid the temptation to put people's backs up quite so effectively! Of course there should be a "complete set of articles" on this subject as on any subject - whether it be mainstream, fringe, batshit-crazy or truth-universally-acknowledged. We have in fact created many such articles. Despite being a "Stratfordian" I have created or greatly expanded articles on Derbyite theory, on Prince Tudor theory and on many other related topics. The problem with Oxfordian Theory – Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays is that it is inherently and irretrievably biassed and it gives waaaaay to much weight to overwhelmingly weak or outright fake scholarship. It's inevitably a POV fork. At the fringe theories board there are arguments about deleting and merging articles all the time. Also, we don't typically have endless spin-offs of fringe topics going into detail about arguments for particular theories. We have articles on Atlantis and Root races, describing various theories - from the sensible to the absurd - but not Arguments for the rule of Atlantis by the Toltecs and the Aryans. The "Parallels with" article is essentially the equivalent of such an "arguments for" article (with a few token disclaimers). In fact the phase of Atlantean rule by the Toltecs and Aryans is dealt with in context in the Root race article (Root_race#The_civilization_of_Atlantis), where these important historical theories can be seen in context and without undue weight. In this case too the content is better dealt with in a context in which it can be evaluated. Paul B (talk) 21:15, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

'Hummm, I do wish Nishidani could avoid the temptation to put people's backs up quite so effectively! Of course there should be a "complete set of articles".'

Well, I'll reveal the big mystery. When I saw the 'complete ..set' phrase, I thought of the axiom of choice, where any collection of sets can theoretically generate any number of further sets, with no end to it. Nishidani (talk) 10:15, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

This. We're trying to write an encyclopedia article on the Oxfordian theory, not a book promoting the Oxfordian theory. Those "parallels" which have been picked up in secondary sources can perhaps be merged; the rest can and should be scrapped, because that's not what Wikipedia is for. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:07, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Sure, but this is just the usual Wikipedia problem - sadly, expert views or the collaboration of people who have spent a great deal of time studying the material and believe that it is unarguable that the Stratford Man is indeed also the Author are treated "truthily" as of "equal weight" to the views of numerous well-argued and far-less-well-argued "views", some of them decidedly over on the nutty end of things. The same thing can be observed through numerous iterations and sagas at the Apollo Moon Landings "didn't happen" Conspiracy pages - some are almost like gathering points for the absurd. They would never be allowed in a "serious" encyclopedia but in the maelstrom of WP, it's all fair, so long as it's truthily "sourced" and well "written up". This is clearly the world Jimbo envisaged. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it's just incredibly frustrating. I suppose if you care about it (and probably we all have to care a bit about what WP says on any given subject and the material in it - it looks convincing and the deal with Google makes it found!) you have to be prepared to spend some time at least inserting enough scepticism into it or material that shows people some factual contradiction to the sillier theories. But we all have our own views. I don't find every aspect of Oxfordianism to be completely barking. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 09:25, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

The problem is, those who embrace with a passion the fringe view and multiply articles on wikipedia, never work them towards a minimal level of quality. They just keep plunking loads of 'stuff' in, without regard to order, without a care in the world for presentation, uniformity of citational mode. For years ungrammatical sentences, mispellings, broken links hang about, while the constant fringe editor tinkers and dabs and, above all, challenges anyone who tries to bring the article into a semblance of NPOV. Several have been here for yonks. They dither and dabble, mostly copying and pasting junk from arbitrary but strategic google searches, without ever weighing critically the value or utility of what they net in other than judging 'it serves the cause'. I wouldn't care in the least were another dozen articles ('The history of Oxfordian theory'; 'The de Verean Society'; etc.) created, as long as there was at long last a sign of editorial competence, which there never has been (Nina Green, true (and to her credit), ran through the 17th Earl of Oxford article from top to bottom, but only after we'd fixed much of the outstanding mess. But it was impossible to work with her. The only collaboration consisted in each taking a turn to review the article entirely, in brief intense bouts of editing). It's not a matter of what I or Tom or Paul or whoever privately thinks, or raising the bizarre innuendo, as Mr Wales reads things, that people like myself are trying to block work on articles. I, like several others, am endeavouring to make atrocious articles at least readable, well-sourced, and critically informed, something that was objected to in the strongest terms by fringe editors who just like ladling in goops of undigested opinions from laundresses, cardiologists, epidemiologists, journos who write about the New York Theatre or the Boston Sox or Rolling Stone, distant relatives of the Earl, people in business administration, lawyers, theatrical directors. I don't mind Mr Wales' fascination with what these oddbods might say, but I think he'd do well to recall that the politics of The New York Banner will never build what the Howard Roarks of this world can create. Nishidani (talk) 10:03, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, well, people who strongly hold views based on poor research, counterfactual arguments and myths are not particularly likely to be keen on intensive rational discussion and analysis of those, if they have become something they care passionately about. I've often found that it's the fear of it being revealed that one has been systematically conned and tricked that makes a large percentage of people continue to cling to extreme theories, even if they are lamentably obviously false. If you've thought one way for a long time because you took some books on trust and then later find they were all bunk, you feel annoyed with yourself and quite possibly very defensive. The same phenomenon occurs in the Moon Landings conspiracy; the fact that international space agencies are now sending back vivid images of the landing sites from lunar orbiters still does not convince some. WP is, sadly, frequently not a place where rational discussion prevails. The same can be seen in Nazi-era articles, where a determined group of neo-Nazi editors routinely attempt to sanitise, alter and rewrite perceptions of key people, themes and incidents. Jamesinderbyshire (talk) 12:19, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Right. I strongly suspect Loss aversion (AKA sunk cost dilemma) to be one of the major motivations for Oxfordians. When you've invested years and even your entire career in some cases into something as ridiculous as Oxfordism, then your arguments become more and more bizarre because they primarily function as defense mechanisms and not the result of scholarly or logical thought. I know some very intelligent anti-Stratfordians who actually prefer to not defend their beliefs because of the cognitive dissonance necessary and the concomitant stress.

In any case, regardless of personal preferences, WP is an encyclopedia, and its content should meet certain standards, which that article does not. The community has rejected it once already; it existence is the result of an effort to get around that decision. Tom Reedy (talk) 12:54, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

The consensus I'm seeing is to merge anything that can be compressed into something worthwhile and to delete the rest. On hold out, whoever it is from, does not stop the consensus.--Peter cohen (talk) 12:32, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

But what is usable? The article is accurate in that it reports the actual arguments, but inaccurate in that those arguments are based on distortions and flat-out fantasy (the Horatio/Francisco name "translations" is a good example). Listing the points and then debunking them creates one of those back-and-forth fringe argument articles that WP discourages, because that's not what an encyclopedia article should be. Some of the "parallel" arguments are already in this article; does it really need to be comprehensive, since most of the points are strained and bogus? But reporting only the strongest ones gives an inaccurate impression of the Oxfordian arguments and lends more credibility than it has, since Oxfordians appear to actually believe even their most ridiculous assertions. I say only those arguments that have been responded to in reliable sources should be included in this article, which also gives a biased view because academics and experts have only responded to them because they are wrong, creating a selection bias. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:08, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I am moving my reply to Roscelese from above; otherwise this section will become yet another unreadable mish-mash.

Yes, the page was deleted, but it was then merged into this article, and then recreated with a slightly different title. Here's the history, as I outlined it in the SAQ arbitration:

1. 7/16/2009 Smatprt creates an Oxfordian article (using an unreliable promotional source).

2. On 3/24/2010, article Oxfordian theory: Parallels with Shakespeare’s plays deleted as a result of afd: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Oxfordian theory: Parallels with Shakespeare's plays because of "Inherent violation of WP:NPOV: extreme undue weight given to a fringe theory."

3. That day Smatprt merges the article back into the Oxfordian article "as per talk at merge discussion". Huh??? An AfD is a "merge discussion"?

4. On 6/18/2010 he moves the material to a sandbox.

5. On 9/9/2010, after being laundered through the sandbox, he then forks it into a new article, Oxfordian Theory - Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays, replaces the colon with a dash, adds two grafs of "NPOV" disclaimer and 17 external Oxfordian links.

6. He then again deletes the material from the main article and links the two. Voilà! Wikipedia hosts virtually the exact same article! So much for WP process.

I have no idea what G4 means, but in Oxfordania, nothing ever really goes away; the arguments are recycled endlessly, even after having been thoroughly discredited. The reappearance of the page is just SOP for Oxfordians. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:29, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Here's a list of the specific differences between the deleted article and the present one. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:02, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

• I redirected the sub-article here. Given that there was a consensus to delete it in the past and no consensus has emerged to keep it, there is no question but that it should not be its own article; anyone who feels like selectively merging can do so, since a redirect preserves the edit history. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:54, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Neutrality issues with moved section

I am moving this recently inserted section here to discuss:

"Methodology of Oxfordian argument"

"In lieu of historical documentary evidence or any link between Shakespeare of Stratford and Oxford, Oxfordians discard the methods used by historians and use other types of arguments to make their case, the most common being supposed parallels between Oxford's life and Shakespeare's works. Another is finding cryptic allusions to Oxford's supposed play writing in other literary works of the era that to them suggest that his authorship was obvious to those "in the know". Scholars have described their methods as subjective and devoid of any evidential value, saying they use a "double standard", "consistently distort and misrepresent the historical record", "neglect to provide necessary context" and calling some of their arguments "outright fabrication"."

I don't see how starting an article with a paragraph that basically calls one side of the debate liars is in any way neutral. The entire graph seems to have been inserted to influence the reader towards an editorial voice that should not even be there.

I also rolled back the deletion of the entire 1604 section which was deleted with the summary "Elided a lot of stuff already covered amply on the SAQ page" which is clearly backwards to WP policy (as well as completely inaccurate). The Oxfordian overview is at SAQ, but the expanded details obviously belong here, in the expanded article. The SAQ section is merely a summary, as policy clearly dictates. Besides, there are dozens of diffs where the main editors repeatedly insisted that "detail" such as the entire 1604 argument, belong only here in this article. Perhaps this was all cut by mistake?Smatprt (talk) 05:17, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

The organization of the page conformed to the organization of the lede almost point-by-point. The material on Oxford's Italian travels belongs in biographical evidence, not a general "other" category; likewise the 1604 argument. If you look at this version, you can see that although the bottom half of the page was still in bad shape, the page was beginning to have a coherent shape and follow a logical argument; your edits have undone that. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:47, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

In addition, you evidently failed to notice that the reference style has been changed and re-inserted the anything-goes style of citation. Tom Reedy (talk) 05:13, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Important WP:FRINGE guidelines for this page

I am going to be restoring some of the material that Smatprt deleted. This page has been unsatisfactory for quite some time, but IMO it had been improved, albeit imperfectly, and I don't think restoring the old material will improve it any. Here are several key points that I think are important to keep in mind when editing the page:

1. The prominence of fringe views needs to be put in perspective relative to the views of the entire encompassing field; limiting that relative perspective to a restricted subset of specialists or only amongst the proponents of that view is, necessarily, biased and unrepresentative. To me this indicates that the academic consensus must be present when describing Oxfordian arguments, and more so than a cursory, "Although traditional scholars reject all Oxfordian claims, (insert specific argument here.)"

2. The neutral point of view policy requires that all majority and significant-minority positions be included in an article. This speaks for itself: the academic consensus cannot be walled off to a few token sentences.

3. Articles which cover controversial, disputed, or discounted ideas in detail should document (with reliable sources) the current level of their acceptance among the relevant academic community. So all those detailed Oxfordian arguments cannot stand alone; they must be accompanied with the academic consensus. This is clear cut.

4. Such articles should first describe the idea clearly and objectively, then refer the reader to more accepted ideas, and avoid excessive use of point-counterpoint style refutations. It is also best to avoid hiding all disputations in an end criticism section, but instead work for integrated, easy to read, and accurate article prose. Unless I'm missing something, the lede is no exception to this. Describing the ideas includes inserting summary statements about the acceptance of those ideas by the academic Shakespearean community, and stating the objective academic consensus is not calling "one side of the debate liars", nor is it a violation of WP:NPOV.

Finally, this page, and well as any page broadly related to Shakespeare authorship question, is still (and as far as I know will always be) under discretionary sanctions by the Arbitration Committee. Editors of the page must conform to expected standards of behavior and the normal editorial process, which includes talk page participation before making any controversial edits. The committee's full decision can be read at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Shakespeare authorship question#Final decision. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:32, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Tom, your version stated "Scholars have described their methods as subjective and devoid of any evidential value, saying they use a "double standard", "consistently distort and misrepresent the historical record", "neglect to provide necessary context" and calling some of their arguments "outright fabrication". Now Tom, the last time I checked, "outright fabrication" means lying. And that is not NPOV. I will respond to the rest of the above this weekend. I am actually happy to be having this discussion and look forward to hashing it out with you. Cheers. Smatprt (talk) 07:20, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

This is exactly the wilful misinterpretation of WP:NPOV that I referred to on your talk page. Having been through an arbcom case which endorsed your long topic ban and which used as some of its concluding principles the correct interpretation of NPOV, then your continued misinterpretation has to be taken as tendentious editing.--Peter cohen (talk) 12:30, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I've redirected the other page to here, which is how I found this thread. Alarbus (talk) 12:39, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Outright fabrication is indeed lying. There is no rule against accusing someone of lying if indeed a reliable source puts that point of view. You may be shocked to discover that sometimes people do in fact lie. We cannot hide that in cases where it is proved. Even in cases where it is not, but reliable sources make the accusation, we should include those, properly attributed. Of course we must abide by WP:BLP, where that applies, but the claim as it stood was not being made about any specific living individual. I have to say that my experience of Oxfordian literature is that outright mendacity is commonplace - perhaps one could call it "pious fraud". It's not true of the early writers - Looney was patently sincere - but becomes more common from the 1940s onwards. Of course my impression cannot go in the article, but I am not the only one who has taken this view, and some of those who have expressed it are indeed proper sources. Paul B (talk) 19:17, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Enlighten Me

Tom Reedy, could you please enlighten me why my Revision as of 22:57, 10 November 2011[7] was reverted by you as an "inappropriate edit"? Thanks. Knitwitted (talk) 18:03, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

The edit was one in a series from 22:14, 10 November 2011 to 22:57, 10 November 2011 that qualify as disruptive edits to make a point concerning an ongoing discussion, which was made even more evident by your response to the cheerleading from a topic-banned editor, which he continues to do days after he assured admins he would stop. See WP:GAME. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:27, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I read it. It repeated material that was in the previous sentence, so it created repetition. Its only original element cited an article that is not considered a reliable source by Wikipedia's standards. Paul B (talk) 18:07, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I took out the previous sentence because it was incorporated in the new, expanded paragraph. Brief Chronicles is a RS as it is indexed in both MLA International Bibliography and World Shakespeare Bibliography... both RS. Knitwitted (talk) 18:25, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

No, being "indexed" does make something a reliable source. Paul B (talk) 18:30, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Paul, Brief Chronicles meets all the criteria of WP:RS does it not ? Why are you trying to disqualify it as one ?--Rogala (talk) 10:28, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Please review all the qualifications of WP:RS, not just one element, as well as all the discussions concerning it (I trust you know how to use the various board search functions). Being indexed is a qualification for it being notable enough to have its own WP article. (I must add that as far as I'm concerned it is RS when used to document Oxfordian claims for this particular page, but not when it's accompanied by any editorial content or OR conclusions, as was done in this case.) Tom Reedy (talk) 18:27, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Tom, for your explanation. I've rewritten the paragraph in question to exclude the editorial commentary. Knitwitted (talk) 20:20, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

A few points: don't introduce the BC article as a "possible solution", just explain what they say. As a general rule anything cited in a WP article should have been reviewed or responded to in the appropriate venues, and since as far as I know this one hasn't been, it qualifies more as advocacy than as a legitimate cite of information. And don't link "Oxfordians" to the Edward de Vere article. The reader expects a link to explain what a term means or to explain a reference. A biography doesn't explain the word, which is sufficiently explained in the article (it is, after all, in the title). Tom Reedy (talk) 22:54, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tom. I'm a bit confused by what "appropriate venues" means. Brief Chronicles is a peer-reviewed journal and is indexed in both MLA and WSB (Aren't these both RS? And if so, wouldn't any and all journals they deem to be noteworthy also be RS?) Could you give some examples of what "appropriate venues" would be acceptable? Thank you for calling my attention to the bad wiki-link. (Fixed) And thanks for your "possible solution" suggestion. (Fixed) Knitwitted (talk) 15:30, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

If by "peer-reviewed" you mean "reviewed by other Oxfordians", then you are correct. However, meaningful peer review usually a blind reading by uninterested scholars working in the field, usually professional, tenured academics. Reliable sources used by WP should have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, which this one does not. By "appropriate venues", I mean responses in related academic publications or books written by authors knowledgeable in the subject, such as a book review in SQ, citation in another published paper, or a direct response in a peer-reviewed journal. Read WP:RS and WP:NPOV and WP:V, in their entirety.

Being indexed is not guarantee of reliability or of a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy; as far as WP is concerned, being indexed is merely a criterion for it having its own WP article. And no, mention in one RS does not convey RS status by consanguinity. Tom Reedy (talk) 16:51, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Brief Chronicle's editorial board and peer review process. Knitwitted (talk) 18:21, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, we all know who they are. Paul B (talk) 19:17, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

No it does not. This has been extensively diescussed. Paul B (talk) 00:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Reorganization of article

IMO this article is poorly organized and the sections aren't sequenced logically to make a coherent argument. I propose reorganizing the existing material using the SAQ page as a model. That is, lede, overview, the Oxfordian case (the longest, with subsections for the various biographical, literary, and autobiographical parallels in the plays and poems), case against the Oxfordian case, variations of Oxfordism, history of the Oxfordian movement. I know the history needs to be covered but having it lead the article seems disproportionate to me. When readers (~1,000/day) come here they want to know what it's about, not the history.

Also the citation apparatus is hodge-podge at best, and a lot of the cites don't have page numbers or other useful finding aids. I would like to see that changed into one, high-quality system, such as one of the Harvard templates. But IMO that could wait until the article was reorganized. The reorganization will reveal the bald spots that should be filled in and the duplicated material, and following that with rewriting the cites could be a good opportunity to copy-edit the prose. Who knows that the article might not become one of Wikipedia's finest and be awarded FA status? At the very least it needs improvement up to "Good" quality. Thoughts? Accusations? Insults? Tom Reedy (talk) 14:12, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Um . .well, glad to oblige altruistically, so speaking on behalf of the Anonymouse moral majority out here, get fucked! (crossed my fingers, irony is at an all time low in these places).Nishidani (talk) 20:09, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Nishidani. To tell the truth, the more I look at it the less I want to tackle it. It's the most undigested, ill-written article I believe I've ever seen on Wikipedia, and nobody seems interested in doing anything except keep adding more wretched prose and clumsy arguments. I did a little swapping around, but until someone else expresses an interest I think I'll just let it be for now. If this what they want, more power to them. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:19, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Tell you what, N. I'm not too keen on getting into endless edit wars and losing my serenity over something as trivial as an authorship page—I at least learned that from our last experience. If you (or anybody else) wants to, they can join me at the sandbox we used for the SAQ draft and we can work out something a bit more like an encyclopedia page instead of a promotional tract. I'll limit my edits here to rewriting the "Case against" section and maintaining balance as per my comments above. Tom Reedy (talk) 21:00, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Roland Emmerich

I have a reasonable near-certainty that the director Roland Emmerich both printed and designed properly this page before writes the script of his film Anonymus. Wikipedia may request copyright. ;-) --Sergioadamo (talk) 07:49, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

All WP articles are freely licensed for use by anyone. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:17, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

"oppose" vs "debunk"

Oppose: Disapprove of and attempt to prevent, esp. by argument: "those who oppose capital punishment"; Actively resist or refuse to comply with (a person or a system).

Debunk: Expose the falseness or hollowness of (a myth, idea, or belief).

While it is true that the two external sites disapprove of Oxfordism, the main purpose of them both is to expose the falseness of the belief, not just oppose it. There is nothing POV in using the plain meaning of a word. The academic consensus is that Oxfordism is a fringe belief with no merit; the two sites listed debunk Oxfordian beliefs and arguments. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:17, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

As per policy, section heads are to be neutral. The plain meanings of words is immaterial in this regard. Just use neutral phrasing and there won't be a problem. Smatprt (talk) 14:47, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Chronology merge not warranted

The result of the discussion of the Oxfordian chronology page was to delete, not merge and delete. IOW, it did not meet the relevant criteria for content of the encyclopedia, failing the verifiability and POV policies, as well as the notability policy. See WP:DELETE, and especially Alternatives to deletion. Tom Reedy (talk) 23:24, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Your making things up again. The closers comments mention none of the things you say. I've added content, and it is sourced.Smatprt (talk) 15:18, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

The AfD (here) was closed by an admin as "The result was delete." That means the material is deleted, not featured in another article. Johnuniq (talk) 02:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it means the article was deleted, for reasons unstated by the closer. The material itself, along with any sourcing, is another matter entirely. If, indeed, the article was deleted as a POV fork, that objection obviously does not apply here.Smatprt (talk) 14:51, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

This article is supposed to cover the Oxfordian case, not every extrapolation arrived at by the assumption that the case is true. The chronology is not part of the argument. If someone were to ask, "Why is Oxford thought to be the writer of Shakespeare?" no one would think to give them a chronology with the expectation that it would convince the interlocutor.

I pointed you to the subsection Alternatives to deletion, which is policy, not a guideline or suggestion, which states, "If the article's content severely fails the verifiability or neutral point of view policies, but when the topic is notable, the article may be reduced to a stub or completely deleted by consensus at WP:AfD. The Arbitration Committee has topic banned editors who have serially created articles failing the neutral point of view, and whose articles have been deleted at AfD on lack of neutrality grounds." In this case the decision was to delete the article, not delete and merge; the content was neither neutral nor notable, and the sources were not reliable. It was a POV fork and there was no direction to merge or redirect (see WP:Merge and delete). Importing it into this article does not lend it any more neutrality or notability or reliability than it had then. Here is an example of a merge and redirect] for comparison. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:01, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

you have cited no policy which supports deleting the material in question from this particular article. (As a section in the overall article, its obviously not a POV fork. BTW, the closer did not say why the old article was deleted, so stop putting words in their mouth. If you contest this material take it to the appropriate dispute resolution venue. Smatprt (talk) 14:39, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

It is perfectly reeasonable to have a section saying that Oxfordians often redate the plays to fit the life of Oxford. If we are to be NPOV, we would have to include the significant disagreements - Streitz has him still alive and writing the Tempest after 1604; Looney says he didn't write it at all. Others have a wide range of views. What we don't want is the pretence that there is some consensus of Oxfordian dating. It would be genuinely useful to summarise the views of Eva Clark, writing shortly after Looney, and add a bit on how Allen, Ogburn sr and Ogburn jr developed or altered chronologies, along with PT writers such as Streitz and Beauclerk. This should be done descriptively and concisely. BTW, I don't see any evidence that Tom is putting words into anyone's mouth. Paul B (talk) 14:55, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

In discussing the "result", Tom says "IOW (in other words), it did not meet the relevant criteria for content of the encyclopedia, failing the verifiability and POV policies, as well as the notability policy." Actually, the closer said none of those things. Tom is indeed putting those "other words" into the mouth of the closer, deciding for himself why the article was deleted, and then stating it above as an undisputed fact. Smatprt (talk) 15:06, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Since these were the very arguments made for deletion, it seems reasonable to assume that they were the ones accepted by the closing admin. You are creating drama and waving round accusations pointlessly. Paul B (talk) 15:10, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh please, AFDs are full of unfounded accusations and bogus arguments, as you well know. For anyone to "assume" what was on the closer's mind is simply presumptuous. Smatprt (talk) 15:20, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh please. so you are saying that we must assume that all such deletions are for no discernable reason and carry on as though they meant nothing at all and there are no consequences. That really is wikilawyering. Paul B (talk) 15:25, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Paul can you not be so rude in your discussions? Repeating the "oh please" is rather insulting. And no, I did not say "that we must assume that all such deletions are for no discernable reason" Please don't put words in my mouth, and please stop with the accusations of wikilawyering. These constant insults and assumptions of bad faith are not helpful.Smatprt (talk) 18:23, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh, so it's alright for you to say "oh please" but not me? The term "wikilawyering" is widely used, as you well know, and is not "rude". Drawing a conclusion from what you say is not putting words into your mouth. This response is sheer hypocrisy. And if you think that statement is rude, you should look in the mirror. Paul B (talk)

See here. The reason given was WP:N and WP:V, i.e. it did not meet the relevant criteria for content of the encyclopedia, specifically failing the verifiability and the notability policy. Tom Reedy (talk) 20:14, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

The reasons given were about a stand-alone article, period. If you can direct me to a policy link that says all material from a deleted article is prohibited from the entire encyclopedia, please do so. Otherwise, it looks like just another deletion tactic. In any case, the Oxfordian Chronology, as developed by Clark and Ogburn, and as criticized by E&V, Simonton and Shapiro, is part of the Oxfordian Theory and needs to be represented. Smatprt (talk) 18:36, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Of course the chronology can be discussed here. That means summarising the main arguments, disputes and responses from mainstream writers, not adding masses of irrelevant stuff. Paul B (talk) 18:53, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

I have already pointed you to the relevant sections about content and why it didn't meet the standards for inclusion. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:55, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Smatprt, you seem to be exhibiting the same pattern as you did before the arbitration and your topic ban: accusing your editors of uncivil behaviour and dishonesty on the flimsiest of excuses and demanding justifications from policy after it's already been provided. I have asked an administrator to review the dispute here and take action if called for. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:11, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Jeez

This article is full of the most appallingly disingenuous stuff. Take the following:

Detailed study of the play [Love's Labour's Lost] from an Oxfordian point of view dates from Eva Turner Clark's 1933 study,[76] which sought to identify a number of characters in the play with various historical prototypes, among them Henry, King of Navarre (Ferdinand, King of Navarre), Marechal di Biron (Biron), Henri I d'Orléans, duc de Longueville, Governor of Picardie (Longaville), and Duc du Maine (Dumain). This similarity of names has seemed too close to be coincidental, and Clarke's identifications have been followed by numerous other Oxfordian scholars, among them Ogburn and Ogburn (1952).[77]

Leaving aside the fact that the author apparently can't decide how to spell Eva Clark's name, this passage implies that it is fact that "this similarity of names has seemed too close to be coincidental", as though this is in some sense evidence of Oxford's authorship, as if WS could not have possibly heard of these people! In any case, there is no acknowledgement of the fact that this is barely more than the wholesale appropriation of a Derbyite argument, which just involves crossing out Derby's name and adding Oxford's instead. There is no appreciable "Oxfordian" aspect to it beyond this. Of course the Derbyites just got it from mainstream speculation that the play was inspired by famous events at the court of Navarre to start with. Thus a perfectly unremarkable bit of material is twisted to imply that this is amazing evidence in favour of Oxford. That's just one of many arguments ripped from context. The central problem is that description of an argument is presented in a way that becomes advocacy. Paul B (talk) 15:04, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, it's full of stuff like that that most people don't even know is POV. How does that even fit in the topic? Every entry in this article needs to be put to the test of whether it's something that describes the Oxfordian theory or is it just there to throw fairy dust in the eyes of the reader. The page needs a lot of work but the problem is that it's a pain to work on and most editors don't want the hassle. Tom Reedy (talk) 06:20, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The irony is that Clark does make specifically Oxfordian arguments - attempting to date the play to the 1570s, by arguing that it's joking about the trend of Euphuism at the time, but this stuff about the names goes at least as far back as Sidney Lee and has no real relevance to the Oxfordian case. The more I think about this, the more I am convinced that this article needs to have a clearer sense of the history of ideas. Otherwise we just get a jumble of 'arguments' from various sources thrown in higgledepiggledy (is that how you spell that? Probably not). The basic Oxfordian arguments need to be identified, yes, but I think we should have sections showing how they developed, and how they fit into or engage with mainstream views. That means looking at the arguments made by the range of writers from Looney to Beauclerk. Paul B (talk) 17:21, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

I dunno, that would probably make an awfully long article. No doubt the main arguments of Looney, Ogburn, and Anderson should be summarized in some coherent form. I think identifying and grouping those main arguments and rearranging the page in a coherent order should be the first priority, as I have suggested, but again, most editors don't want the hassle of fighting an uphill battle with those who think the page should be promotional instead of informational. As you said, the page as it is is just an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink dumping ground. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:24, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Of course if the entire history were there it would be awfully long. Equally if all the 'arguments' and counter arguments were added it would be awfully long. The PT article has essentially that structure and it's fairly short. At the moment chunks of Ogburn, Clark, Barrell, Sobran and whoever are added all over the place, along with barely relevant lengthy passages like the bit of Chapman which has almost no relevance to any Oxfordian argument at all, but which Smatprt insisted on re-adding in full. Paul B (talk) 18:31, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Who's responsible for this obviously Stratfordian interpretation of Oxfordian Theory?

The following passage needs to be cited to, or removed if no citation/quotation is provided: " . . . although Marston calls the passage an example of "hotchpodge giberdige" written by bad poets, and nowhere does Marston mention Oxford explicitly as a poet, bad or otherwise." I feel a full of quote of Marston asserting this is needed.

The sentence "Mainstream scholar Scott McCrea argues . . ." Should be changed to "Stratfordian scholar Scott McCrea argues . . ." All references to "Mainstream scholars" in this article should be changed to say "Stratfordian scholars" to reflect the fact there is a highly contentious debate on this issue.

The sentence "Oxford's biographer, Alan Nelson, remarks that "(c)ontemporary observers such as Harvey, Webbe, Puttenham and Meres clearly exaggerated Oxford's talent in deference to his rank." - should note that Nelson is a Stratfordian. In fact, a number of interpolations like this one, placed in the main part of the article by obviously Stratfordian editors in order to make the Oxfordian case seem less persuasive than it actually is, should be placed in the Case Against Oxfordianism section.

What would be the purpose of changing the name of the Polonius character from Corambis in the quarto edition if not to suppress the clear link the character's name has to Burghley's motto? The article should reflect that the "mainstream" explanation for the Corambis name begs the question why change it in the first place if it merely refers to old cabbage, and is not a cunning pun on the motto of a powerful official?

Lastly, i have issues with this passage: "Contemporary writers exaggerated de Vere's poetic accomplishments in deference to his rank, and the testimony of Meres that de Vere was 'best for comedy' is followed by a further comment naming Shakespeare, which shows Meres knew that Oxford and Shakespeare were not the same man." I don't have a copy of Ogburn in front of me, but I remember pretty clearly that he explains this by quoting a list of prominent authors, from the 19th or 20th centuries, by a writer that wasn't aware that one author used a pen name for some of his works, and his real name for others. Why not include a cite/quote from this page in Ogburn's book when discussing this argument? As the Meres list is one of the favorite pieces of evidence in the Stratfordian argument, i should think that a reasonable explanation as provided by Ogburn is essential. Especially when considering this article freely cites to any and all Stratfordian work that seeks to undermine a strong Oxfordian piece of evidence. JohnDavidStutts (talk) 21:50, 1 November 2011 (UTC)JohnDavidStutts

Forget about it. If you are here to say that the ironclad consensus of serious academically qualified experts is to be reduced to a POV on a par with that of a fringe perspective developed by, mostly, amateurs with no professional grounding in historical scholarship or textual criticism (Stratfordians(anti-Stratfordians), you'd best do that on any of the infinite number of internet blogs. This has all been comprehensively discussed and decided on in the archives, which you are welcome to peruse at your leisure. Nishidani (talk) 21:52, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

The page needs a lot of work, but any edits must conform to Wikipedia's policies--all of them, including the purpose of Wikipedia, the expected standards of behavior, and all normal editorial processes. The page is also under sanctions of the Arbitration Committee, which has permitted administrators to impose, at their own discretion, sanctions on any editor working on pages broadly related to Shakespeare authorship question if the editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the above standards. The committee's full decision can be read at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Shakespeare authorship question#Final decision. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:33, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

@Nishi: So how does the Authorship Question remain a “fringe theory” when an orthodox Stratfordian who happens to be a chaired Columbia professor acknowledges the subject by writing a book on the topic for a well-known publisher for distribution to a mainstream audience and bottom line profiting quite nicely from the so-called “fringe theory” which he should have ignored in the first place because a “fringe theory” is a well-known unacceptable school of thought and not worthy of comment? Knitwitted (talk) 16:07, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

See Alien Abduction and John Edward Mack-Nishidani (talk) 16:52, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

That's very good: "Harvard then issued a statement stating that the Dean had "reaffirmed Dr. Mack's academic freedom to study what he wishes and to state his opinions without impediment..."" Interesting how Dr. Mack actually conducted primary clinical research on subjects he initially suspected were suffering from mental illness as per his qualifications in that field as opposed to Dr. Shapiro (per Contested Will) who merely conducted cut-n-paste secondary research from others' projects without qualifications as an historian. Shapiro is not an historian... he is a comparative literature major. He is out of his field on the history of the authorship question. Still doesn't explain my question of how he could profit (financially and high-profile media blitz-wise) on any part of a theory that doesn't flow mainstream. i.e. He's using other people's ideas for his personal gain. Knitwitted (talk) 18:44, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Shapiro is a specialist on Shakespeare - that includes the whole milieu. The "history of the authoship question" is not a distinct topic area within academia. In any case, it is not remotely clear what your argument is. The fact that a serious academic writes about a topic does not stop it from being fringe. Serious academics have written about "alien abduction", religious cults, etc. The fact that E.P. Thompson wrote a lot about Muggletonianism does not stop it being a fringe belief. Paul B (talk) 19:02, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

O excellent. He's "a specialist on Shakespeare - that includes the whole milieu" being the man and his writings. He's not an expert on the contenders for the authorship of the Shakespearean canon. Instead of ignoring others' beliefs, Shapiro has advanced the so-called "fringe theory" into the public's eye (just how many people knew about the theory before his book?) and continues to do so much to his personal gain. Knitwitted (talk) 19:20, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

So are you saying that an academic who studies and writes about a fringe theory makes the topic of his study no longer a fringe theory? Tom Reedy (talk) 19:39, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm saying he's a highly-positioned academic who readily and willingly promotes a fringe theory into mainstream. Knitwitted (talk) 21:28, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Knitwitted, your comments are not arguments. The authors of anti-Strat books also make money from their publications. Emmerich and Orloff make money from their film etc. We don't sneer at them for that. The Anti-strat theory has gone in and out of the public eye over the century and half it has existed. Having researched and written his book Shapiro is now an expert on the theory, yes. That's how academic life works. An expert is a scholar who researches a topic, not a "believer". Research into the history and cultural significance of an idea is a wholly different matter to research into the plausibility of an idea. Mainstream scholars overwhelmingly reject anti-Strat ideas, as you well know. Paul B (talk) 19:43, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry to disagree Paul B. but the "Anti-strat theory has gone in and out of the public eye over the century and half" doesn't mean it was a widely-known theory. A handful of people may have known and discussed it but what prominent academic pushed it into the eyes of the mainstream public before Shapiro? Anti-Strats promote their own ideas not the ideas of Strats. I doubt any of the anti-Strats have profited from their own ideas anywhere near what Shapiro has. The anti-Strat publications probably had a very small readership until Shapiro's book promoted their ideas into the mainstream... he's an academic who profits from others' work and has turned a "fringe theory" into a viable academic pursuit. Knitwitted (talk) 21:28, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I have absolutely no idea why you're bringing this up. If you want to contest the idea that the SAq is a fringe theory, the WP:Fringe theories/Noticeboard is the place to do that. However, you should do your homework and review the relevant talk pages as well as the arbitration to see what kind of response you're liable to meet and whether you think it will be worth your time. Tom Reedy (talk) 22:10, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Considering I've been met by the tres amigos here, I'd have to say "not". But thanks for trying Tom. Hoping one day the anti-Strat books will be considered to be WP:RS. Not every independent researcher is fortunate to attend school. Very ironic. We all agree the Strat Shakespeare didn't have a higher education but only a Ph.D scholar is qualified to review his work... at least per Wikipedia's standards. Knitwitted (talk) 22:32, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

What does your response about sources or Shakespeare's education or who is or is not "qualified to review his work" have to do with whether the topic is considered a fringe theory? Many fringe theories are written about by academics; that does not magically promote them into being theories accepted by the mainstream. I fail to see how this exchange does anything to improve the article (nor do I see how your edits are relevant to the topic). Tom Reedy (talk) 22:55, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Apparently something since you chose to respond rather than ignore my misguided theory. Best, KW Knitwitted (talk) 17:36, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Verses Made by the Earl of Oxforde

For User:Tom Reedy. You undid my last editing as a joker. However, the headings should be consistent with the text. If there is a mention of "Verses Made by the Earl of Oxforde" in the article, which was the spelling of that time, so this exact wording should be kept and not arbitrarily changed. Otherwise, if you take "Oxford" instead of "Oxforde", you should rather have "Verses made by the Earl of Oxford" as a heading. For reasons of authenticity, I would prefer to change the wording back to what I proposed yesterday. --Zbrnajsem (talk) 09:23, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

It was this edit which changed the heading "Verses Made by the Earl of Oxford" by spelling the name as "Oxforde". At Wikipedia, editors decides on a name to be used to refer to a subject, then sticks to that name. Often, particularly in historical articles, the text includes quotes with variant spellings, but the heading has to make sense to the not necessarily well-informed reader: Is "Oxforde" referring to some other person? Being consistent in the headings is correct. Johnuniq (talk) 09:33, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

But what about the text below? Please read it. It is historically correct. --Zbrnajsem (talk) 10:29, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

There was no "correct" spelling at the time. In fact he used to sign his own name with the spelling "Oxenford". We normally use standard modern spelling, except in quotations. See WP:NAME. Paul B (talk) 13:45, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I see your point. It's spelling used in Anne's handwritten title. In that case you have a reasonable argument. The title should also be italicised. Paul B (talk) 13:56, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

It is done. --Zbrnajsem (talk) 14:41, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I've had a look at the content of this section, which made me rather suspicious. The way it is phrased implies that the poem (which is not named, but is PP No.18: "Whenas thine eye...") is listed as a work by Oxford. In fact, it seems that it is not. The manuscript is a transcribed bound-collection of poems by many authors: Sidney, Raleigh, Dyer, Oxford, Anne Vavasour and John Bentley - as well as the unknown author of "Whenas thine eye", which, of course, is not generally believed to be by Shakespeare, like most of the PP poems. Others are attributed in marginal annotations. It's not known when the attribution annotations were made. "Whenas mine eye" is specifically not listed as one of the poems "by the Earl of Oxforde", so unless the works of Dyer, Raleigh et al are also being claimed as the work of Oxford, this argument is yet another example of pure sleight of hand. Oh, and the full title of that section of the manuscript is "verses made by the Earl of Oxforde and Mrs Anne Vavasor". Paul B (talk) 14:59, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

You're right; it's typical Oxfordian misdirection. The supposed title ""verses made by the Earl of Oxforde and Mrs Anne Vavasor" is how the poems are titled in Rawlinson Poetry MS 85, in the Bodleian Library (although Vavasor's name is scored out), not in the book under discussion. I have renamed the subsection and added some context to make it clear. The book itself can be viewed at the Folger's Luna image viwer. Put MS V.a.89 in the search function. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:45, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and the genealogy and the attribution to Oxford and some others were made by Samuel Lysons, who once owned the book. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:50, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I really don't understand why this is an argument for Oxford, but then again most Oxfordian claims lose quite a bit of impact when the context is included and the misdirection is wrung out. This incident illustrates why every Oxfordian claim in this article has to be chased down to earth. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:20, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I've read Barrell's article. He seems to be saying that the allegedly superior text suggests that Anne Cornwallis had access to an original manuscript, and the family link to Oxford implies that it came from Oxford. Of course exactly the same argument can be made for all the other poems, which are explained as evidence that Oxford was at the centre of a specific "circle" of writers, though no real evidence is offered of this. It's all rather vague and misty. Paul B (talk) 19:36, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

He also states that the poems are in her hand and calls her the "original transcriber". He calls it a "commonplace book", inside quotation marks as if Halliwell describes it as such, when he describes it as "A poetical miscellany of the age of Elizabeth". He then says that since Cornwallis owned it, "its descent from Vere, Earl of Oxford, is clearly deducible"; presumably Oxford left it behind when he sold the property to her father, and in fact Barrell writes, "From some overlooked corner of the Earl's library at Fisher's Folly these verses could have been retrieved, the anonymous "Shakespeare" poem among the others"! Oxfordism is full of such "deductions." He conflates the book with the Rawlinson Poetical MS, which is followed by whoever put the "argument" in this article--repeating errors being another hallmark of Oxfordist scholarship. Another is berating "Stratfordians" for ignoring this smoking-gun evidence of Oxford's authorship while writing Shakespeare biographies, one in which he indulges quite freely. Tom Reedy (talk) 00:17, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Cut it out, Tom (re: Family connections)

O wait... you already did. So why can't these facts be attributed to Shapiro's Contested Will? Knitwitted (talk) 15:34, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Hilarious. As has been repeatedy stated, the issue is not sourcing, it's relevance. Perhaps we can source the colour of de Vere's hair, or whether he preferred his steaks rare or well-cooked, but unless it's been used as part of an authorship argument, it has no place here. Paul B (talk) 17:09, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Facts are irrelevant. Got it. Doesn't the Oxfordian theory revolve around his autobiography? Curious how this works... "The Dark Lady is believed by some Oxfordians to be Anne Vavasour..." when Whittemore's Monument theory proposes the Dark Lady is Queen Elizabeth. And Stephanie Hopkins Hughes' New Light on the Dark Lady (published in the Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter (2000), 1-15) suggests Emilia Bassano Lanier is the Dark Lady. So how does WP decide which theory to promote here? Knitwitted (talk) 19:14, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Promotion? Boh, . . just wondering who Stephanie Hughes is. . .Nishidani (talk) 19:47, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

We also have Delahoyde's Edward de Vere’s Hand in Titus Andronicus (published in Brief Chronicles Vol. I (2009) 186-204) which relates Stubbs to the play. Knitwitted (talk) 19:22, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

In short, we're to rewrite the article according to everything and anything members of a coterie write in either the Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter or Brief Chronicles?Nishidani (talk) 19:47, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Would be nice if the Oxfordians were allowed to discuss their own theory. I don't see why the opposers couldn't have their say in an "Arguments Against Oxford" section. Knitwitted (talk) 21:09, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Um, there are a zillion websites for that. We have to work here, which mainly consists in writing articles in accordance with wiki protocols. We only 'discuss' if one of us stuffs up, or stiffs the rules, or pushes a POV. We are, except for articles dealing with a few countries, rather hostile to colonization.:)Nishidani (talk) 21:54, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Wiki protocols... sure I understand your limitations.:) Regarding those zillion websites... don't they push their own POV? Would have thought WP with all its strict guidelines would be the one forum to present each side equally. Knitwitted (talk) 23:04, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Just now saw this. I know the distinction is sometimes elusive, but "presenting each side equally" is not the same as WP:NPOV. WP:N also comes into play as well as WP:5 and WP:NOT. It really takes a while to understand these principles, and sometimes I find myself arguing on the wrong side of them because of my incomplete understanding.

As to my deletion of the material you added, I cannot find where those factoids are any significant (other minor, as far as that goes) part of the Oxfordian argument, nor were they presented as such. Tom Reedy (talk) 13:11, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Facts are irrelevant if they are not related to a theory. How clear does this have to be? As for which of the very many totally contradictory "Oxfordian" theories we should include, well, indeed, that's a very difficult one to answer, which is why my personal view is that the page should be structured historically, to show how the changing ideas and arguments evolved. By the way, Whittemore is very very much a latecomer in the Queen = Dark Lady theory. That theory is older than Looney. It was Baconians wot invented it. And of course Lanier has been proposed as the DL for many years, originally by an obscure writer called A. L. Rowse. You really ought to learn something about the history of ideas. Paul B (talk) 20:01, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Some nits for ya: Hughes' article uses Rowse's theory to relate it to Oxford. Whittemore relates the QE theory to Oxford. I'm guessing the Baconians didn't use their theory to promote Oxford. I do like your idea of showing the evolution of the various theories... but again who would decide which theory (or theories) is/are still being pursued? Presumably being an independent forum, Oxfordians have their various sub-groups (such as PT I and II as well as non-PT). Who decides which theory currently dominates? That could get quite interesting... you could have PT I'ers who go with DL QE and others who go with Bassano. Get my permutable drift? I'm terribly worried :'( you'll risk offending some Oxfordians. Knitwitted (talk) 21:02, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

"Hughes' article uses Rowse's theory to relate it to Oxford". Well, duh. Obviously. "Whittemore relates the QE theory to Oxford." Well, duh. Obviously. How much more of this mind-numbing 'conversation' are we going to have? Whittemore was not even the earliest to do that by a long, long, long way. Read up on the history of your own theory for heaven's sake. Paul B (talk) 21:05, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I know everything about the Oxfordians. I read Dr. Shapiro's Contested Will. He's the expert. Knitwitted (talk) 22:20, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

External link section titles

Thanks Tom... appreciate the clarification. Change of subject: Is there any chance the headings in the "External links" section could be changed to "Oxfordian" and "Stratfordian" like on the "Baconian theory" page? Knitwitted (talk) 15:25, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

My objection would be that all three of the Oxfordian sites do indeed state that their purpose is to promote the Oxfordian theory: see here, here, and here. The two "Stratfordian" sites, while also holding the default pro-Shakespeare position as far as authorship, are Oxfordian-specific: see here and here. I'd be interested in what other editors think. If the section titles are construed as POV violations I would have no objection to changing them, but I would object to the academic consensus being referred to as a "theory", as if the two positions were equivalent in some way. Tom Reedy (talk) 15:58, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Agree that the headings "Oxf" and "Strat" would be inappropriate. Perhaps this would help. Looks like as it stands, the pro-Strat heading is forcing a conclusion before the reader views the external sites. It may be the intention of the authors to debunk the theory, but isn't it up to the reader to draw his own conclusion? Knitwitted (talk) 18:14, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

"His own conclusion" about what? The sites linked make their intention known explicitly; the reader shouldn't have to read out the sites to come to a conclusion about their purposes. The three Oxfordian sites specifically state that their purpose is to promote Oxford as Shakespeare and the two "Stratfordian" sites state specifically that their purpose is to rebut the arguments about Oxford as Shakespeare. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:21, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

By "Pro-Strat heading" she evidently means the phrase "Sites debunking the Oxfordian Theory". I assume it's the word "debunking" that is being objected to, but I wish Knitwitted could be a little bit clearer about what exactly she wants and what she objects to. Paul B (talk) 19:36, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Well the synonyms for "debunk" are disprove, ridicule, cut down to size, deflate, demystify, discover, disparage, expose, lampoon, mock, puncture, show up, uncloak, unmask, and unshroud. "Debunk" is the right word to use for a fringe theory, with kind of a playful, non-serious tone about it, but I suppose "disprove" would work as well, although it seems to me to lend it even more authority. Tom Reedy (talk) 23:23, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Your link is to a policy page about criticism sections. Whether or not one should include such sections depends on the structure of the article. My view of the stucture of this article is that it should have a summary of the main arguments, a historical overview and then a section on specific issues distinctive to Oxfordism (1604 problem; biographical parallels; supposed secret ciphers/references, etc) which should include both arguments and rebuttals on the particular points at issue. These should also include the range of different and sometimes competing arguments put forward. So there should be no single separate criticism section.

All this is wholly separate from the external links issue, which is not to do with Criticism sections. The "Pro-Strat" heading is because that is indeed the mainstream view. It's not a "criticism". However, I don't feel strongly about it. Paul B (talk) 18:39, 14 December 2011 (UTC)