The Illuminated Donkey

My girlfriend Rachel sent me an article from yesterday’s New York Times — "A Historic Whodunit: If Shakespeare Didn't, Who Did?" by William Niederkorn — which offers an overview of the Shakespeare authorship debate, focussing on the Stratfordian vs. Oxfordian battle. Niederkorn gives a lot of ink and credence to the Oxfordian position that the true author was Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, as opposed to the classic Stratfordian position, namely that Shakespeare wrote the work of Shakespeare (and where’s the fun in that?). There’s a lot of good reading on all sides of the debate, even on the clearly wrong Stratford side.