Evening star., 1962-09-01
LETTERS TO THE STAR
:. Cursed Be He That Moves My Bones

By this time The Star will
have received letters de-
nouncing it for publishing so
long a review, by Day Thorpe,
Of the new book Shake
speare: The Man Behind the
Name" by Charlton Ogburn,
jr.. and his mother. Dorothy
Ogburn. That volume. I un-
derstand from q mutual
friend, adds considerable de-
tail to the argument that Ed
ward de We're. 18th Earl Of
Oxford, was the author Of
the Shakespearean works.
Such review-recognition Of
the Oxfordian-authorship ar
gument is. to the genius
from nothingness Willm
Shaksper-authorship tradi-
tionalists. outright sacrilege
and very sad. indeed. Some
will blast The Star, but some
will cry quietly and bemoan
the low intellectual estate to
which The Stars editors have
fallen In admitting there is
any question concerning the
clod-genius.
That is what happened 20
years ago when. as executive
editor Of Scientific American,
/ published in the magazine
an article reporting impor-
tant new findings b. Charles
Wisner Barrell supporting
the argument in the book
Shakespeare Identified" by
j. Thomas Looney and pub
lished about the time of
World War I. Looney, a Brit
ish schoolmaster who had
taught Shakespeare for many
years. was the originator of
the thesis for Oxfordian au-
thorship and had performed
q monumental job Of re-
search to prove it. Though he
had many followers leading
to publication Of more than
80 supporting volumes before
Barrell'S findings. he was the
subject of scathing ridicule.
After publication of his arti-
Gle and its worldwide mem
ton by the Associated Press,
likewise our editors were told
how low on the moron scale
they werel
Scientific Americans in
terest in this subject was the
use Of science in the form Of
X-ray and infra-red photog-
raphy to study certain we'll
known paintings Of Shake
speare." Barrell had per-
formed q brilliant feat, we
felt, In studying photograph
ically the Ashbourne portrait
in the Folger Library (Which
The Star reproduced with its
review and he was equally
brilliant in correlating his
findings with the innumera-
BILE facets Of the argument.
Barrell had been fascinated
by Looney's ll-documented
work. and decided to see
whether he could add any
facts scientifically. He did.
He proved beyond a shadow
Of doubt that the Ashbourne
portrait had been altered
radically with an obvious in
tent to deceive. Some of us
are convinced that it is no
mere coincidence that that
deception leads straight back
to De We're and therefore sup
ports Looney's thesis. We be-
lieve. as Mr.. Ogburn and his
mother do, that the case is
proved.
Star readers may be inter-
ested in certain aspects of
the argument disclosed in MIR.
BARRELS studies.
To emphasize some of the
details mentioned by Mr..
Thorpe: The butchers ap-
prentice, maltSter, money
lender. and land speculator
Of Stratford had practically
no schooling; neither knew
nor spoke any foreign Ian
guages land the legends Of
foreign lands on which most
Of the works were based had
not been translated into Eng
hsl); travelled only between
Stratford and London land
thus could not have gotten
the stories abroad first
hand; had no entire into
Queen Elizabeth's Court land
thus no way to gain intimate
knowledge Of royal court Gus
toms and protocol so deftly
handled In many of the
works.: could not have had
the legal knowledge necessary
to do such a play as The
Merchant of Venice" and
was completely unknown to
any contemporary writer's!
Edward de We're was Eliz-
abeth's Lord Chamberlain,
and q poet and court drama
tist widely known and ac-
claimed by the great ones Of
his time. Barrell says that
he ". not only visited
France, Italy, Germany, and