Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1895-12-12
lCoMMUNIcATED.
AUTHOR OF SHAKESPEARE"

dOrf AstOr IN the PGtt-Mdtt Gdzette, tne
assertion that the man of S ratford did
not write the plays attributed to him
was laughed out of court. To-day it is
admitted by all but the worthy dwellers
by the Avon to be subject for serious
discussion. Even the staunchest ad
herents of the Stratford man admit the
existence of few awkward facts which
cannot be explained away. Let US
glance briefly at some of them.
Of William Shakespeare's youth lit
tie is known, and that little tells
against him. He is supposed to have
received commoD-school education,
there being no other at Stratford, which
would have been course of rudiment-
airy instruction in writing, reading,
arithmetic and general information in
ferior to that now possessed by the
average London cabby. Shakespeare
could certainly boast but little of his
handwriting, and it is astounding that
one who is supposed to have written so
voluminously could have employed so
barberous and SO illegible chirogra-
ply. Fancy play traced in such par
barous characters 1t is useless to af-
firm that such was the general style OF
the age, for the signatures of many of
Shakespeare's contemporaries show
that educated men wrote well.
The village tradition paints him in
colols we should not expect to belong
- the author of the "Sonnets." He
wts reputed iutemperate; he was
whipped for poachipg; he married
Ann Hathaway under circumstances
diacreditable ID them both. At six
ts3n he is said to have been appren-
ticed to butcher, e.ter which he be-
came dealer in wool. Amid so many
uncertainties we know positively that
he came of q family lot one of whom
ould tell the letters in the alpbatet,
end YVES brought up to speak the jargon
used by the village-folk of all England
in those "good old days." which is say-
ing that his speech was as rude es his
" liting.
The first twenty years of his life were
evidently sI snt without books, among
illiteiate people, in the narrow limits Of
a squalid village. We find him at this
peliod d, employed rs stage carpenter,
ventr,;ug occasionally upon subordi-
nat, pe-ts, end, more often, holding
hol1es at the stage door. His life up
to this time wes one of poverty, Of
menial RISKS and base companionships,
while his writings, from the very first,
ere merked by an unrival,d d refinement
end subtlety.
More than this, however, the plays
evincs not only an inc omparable knowl-
edge of the English language, but
vice familis rity with foreign tongues
as well. Their composer is
man of universal reading, delight
ing in the classics, conversant with un-
translated French, Spanish, Danish and
Itclian literature, loving philosophic
speculations. and, in spite of several
geographical errors, evidently travel
Ter. Where could the Stratford man
have acquired all this eruditionP Yet
this phenomenon of universal knowl-
edge, this born arist Dcrat, who has al
ready learned to dc 1pise trade and the
vulgar multitude, this natural genus
who has educated and trained himself
to the loftiest intelle tual flights, and
who repeatedly dilate, upon the sacred
duty of parents to their children, so
neglects his own daughter, Judith, that
at the age of twenty even her best in
the way of q signature is mere scrawl.
In all England there is no trace of
anything written by Shakespeare ex-
cept four signatures, nor is there any
Indication that he possessed library.
1t might be that, after his death, his
papers were wholly destroyed, but this
could not include the letters he must
have written. 1t is not possible to con-
caiye of him as never writing q letter.
The active brain, the varied experience,
the knowledge of mankind, all mark
one who lived among men. Yet,
not only have we not q line from his
hand, but in all contemporary CORE
spondence there is not an allu-
sion to him. He never met with auth.
ors and thinkers, never was present at
single memorable occasion, never ap-
peared at court, never attracted the no.
tice of that intellectual galaxy which
made up the Elizabethan era, and no
man thought enough of him to write
his biography during his life.
It is impossible to reconcile the un.
tortured and sordid conditions, which
are all we know of Shakespeare, with
the philosophy and erudition of the
plays. 1t is incredible that the great
student of that scholarly age should
have spent his life without books,
that ne did not gather library of
choice volumes about him, or that, if
he possessed them. he should, in max
ing his will, have forgotten these COM
panions of his intellectual domain and
have remembered only the common
places of wearing apparel and a
| 'second-best bed" It is impossible to
understand the total disappearance of
his notes, his manuscripts, his cores
pondence, his books, bis diary, or to
reconcile his utter carelessness and in
difference to the fate of his own copies
or of those masterpieces of which he
proudly declares:
Not marble
Nor the gilded monuments of princes
Should outlive this powerful rhyme.
1t was in 1886 or 1857 that the man
of Stratford. then aged about twenty