What’s in a name? Maybe a hidden identity.

Shakespeare Authorship Mystery Day celebrates the world’s greatest literary & historical “whodunnit.” People have long remarked on the strange disconnect between the life of the bookless provincial grain dealer from Stratford and the supremely literate, courtly, political plays and poetry published under the name William Shakespeare. Join Mark Twain, Charlie Chaplin, Sigmund Freud, and former Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O’Connor and John Paul Stevens in wondering who wrote Shakespeare.

Shakespeare Authorship Mystery Day is celebrated annually on November 8, the anniversary of the publication of the First Folio.

The Suspects

You'll want to bring in the following individuals for questioning. Each has been strongly suspected of writing the works attributed to William Shakespeare.

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford

A playwriting poet courtier who studied law and spent a year in Italy touring the haunts that show up as locations in Shakespeare plays, Edward de Vere has been the prime suspect for nearly 100 years. His life experiences show up in the plays, he was at the center of the creative circle that birthed the Elizabethan literary renaissance, and some extant poetry under his name sounds remarkably Shakespearean: read My Mind To Me a Kingdom Is.

More info: Is Oxford Shakespeare? Eight Reasons to Think So | Did Shakespeare Really Write Shakespeare? video

Sir Francis Bacon

Sir Francis Bacon

A philosopher, scientist, and writer, and one of the great geniuses of his age, Bacon was actually identified by contemporaries Joseph Hall and John Marston as the author of Shakespeare’s two blockbuster long poems, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. 19th c. mainstream Shakespeare scholar Horace Howard Furness wrote that “Had the plays come down to us anonymously – had the labour of discovering the author been imposed upon future generations – we could have found no one of that day but Francis Bacon to whom to assign the crown.”

More info: Franics Bacon Research Trust and Francis Bacon Society | Is Bacon Shakespeare? video

 

Christopher Marlowe

Christopher Marlowe

Marlowe was the Elizabethan age’s greatest playwright prior to the appearance of the Shakespeare works. He popularized the blank verse style that would be used by the author of the Shakespeare plays. The circumstances around Marlowe’s 1593 death and the lack of a proper investigation by authorities suggest it was a “hit” by his political enemies or that Marlowe may have even escaped to live — and write — another day.

More Info: The Case for Christopher Marlowe | Frontline: Much Ado About Something video

Thomas Sackville

Thomas Sackville

In 1561, Sackville co-wrote Gorboduc, England’s first play in the Shakespearean blank verse style, and the first classically-inspired play in the English language. 20th c. mainstream Shakespeare scholar Eric Sams called Gorboduc “the manifest source of Shakespeare’s life­long style and idiom.” Sackville, 2nd cousin of Queen Elizabeth, Knight of the Garter, and Lord Treasurer or England, was acclaimed in his lifetime as a gifted and concealed poet.

More info: About Thomas Sackville | The Case for Thomas Sackville

William Shakspere

William Shakspere

His name (well, close enough) is on the plays. Case closed. Or not? There are long-noted peculiarities: people who knew him didn’t seem to know he was a writer; no writings in his hand of any sort have ever been found besides 6 shaky, illegible signatures on legal documents (unrelated to writing); his daughters were illiterate – one couldn’t even sign her name; he appears not to have owned any books, paper, pens at his death; no books he may have owned have ever turned up elsewhere; no document related to him personally is of a literary nature – all 70 pertain to things like money lending and rural business matters.

More info: The Declaration of Reasonable Doubt.

Mary Sidney

Mary Sidney

The first woman to publish a play in English, Mary Sidney was fluent in numerous languages, an accomplished musician, and had an alchemical laboratory at her home. Mary Sidney led the most influential literary circle in England and wrote a version of the Antony and Cleopatra story.

More info: Mary Sidney Society

How to Celebrate November 8th

  • Use the hashtag #ShakespeareAuthorshipMysteryDay
  • Share information about the Shakespeare authorship mystery on your social media channels
  • Sign and share the Declaration of Reasonable Doubt
  • Post new articles or videos on the day
  • Post your favorite resources – books, websites, and articles
  • Share Shakespeare quotes
  • Encourage students to ask their English literature and history teachers about the Shakespeare authorship question
  • Point to weblogs and websites that provide more information

Website created by the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship