Do you believe that Shakespeare actually wrote those plays?

Question

Many historians/budding historians have debated weither William Shakespeare wrote the plays that he claims.
1) Do you believe he wrote them?
2) Why?
3) Do you have evidence?

Answer 1

In your question, Cassie, you may have answered your doubts.

"Many historians/budding historians have debated wether William Shakespeare wrote the plays. . ."

Historians and/or budding historians rather than literary critics are raising the doubts, for the most part. This area has been thouroughly gone over by Shakespeare scholars and 99% of them believe Shakespeare the man actually wrote the plays. The other 0.01% don't care who wrote them.

I think for the most part that it is snobbery that convinces people that somebody other than Shakespeare wrote the plays. They (the non-Stratfordians, as they are called) cannot believe that an uneducated (i.e. he didn't go to university) yokel from a backwater town (which is how they think of Stratford) could possible write in such beautiful language.

I once taught a short course on the other claimants to Shakespeare's works: Marlowe, Bacon, Edward DeVere (Earl of Oxford), Queen Elizabeth, etc. Using the methods employeed by some of the non-Stratfordians, I manged to show that I (and I alone) had written Shakespeare.

It's lots of fun to read about these other claimants. In Samuel Schoenbaum's "Shakespeare's Lives" there is a wonderful chapter on the non-Stratfordians. You should be able to get a copy from your local library, or your local college library.

Have fun.

Answer 2

Historians and budding historians debate many things.

Some actually provide some decent evidence to prove their theories but, in the case of someone else having written Shakespeare's plays other than himself, there is none - the burden of proof for a new theory is on those producing the theory......not the other way round.

But, in answer to your questions,

1. Yes I do believe Shakespeare wrote his own plays
2. The "why" is simply because in the absence of any other proof, the author is who everybody (apart from conspiracy theorists) believes it to be, and the proper evidence leads us to this conclusion.
3. There is a lot of evidence if only people would open their eyes and minds. When the plays were published in quarto and folio format they were attributed to Shakespeare - if there was any doubt that close in time surely there would have been some doubt in the attribution. It is possible to trace writing styles through the plays which lead to a single authorship. Many of the allusions in the plays fit with our knowledge of Shakespeare's political and religious leanings. There is documented evidence from the time that the plays were being dramatised on stage that they were written by Shakespeare.

I come to the fact that the weight of evidence, although not a 100% proof, leans towards the authorship being by Shakespeare and no-one else. There is no proper evidence (only conjecture) that leads us in any other direction.

Answer 3

Shakespeare wrote his own plays. Those who propose the idea that they were written by someone else are delusional. They have no evidence that anyone other than William Shakespeare wrote those plays.

Answer 4

1) Yes

2) Because of evidence that Shakespeare did write his plays and lack of credible evidence to say someone else did.

3) Yes

Answer 5

1. Yes

2. He said he did

3. Lack of evidence to the contrary

Answer 6

Of course he wrote those plays, people back then were brilliant! And no, I have no proof he wrote those plays, but do you have proof he didn't??