Couldn’t tell you exactly when or where it was published, but I once read an essay by Asimov defending the Stratfordian view. I don’t recall any of the specifics, but he did rebut an argument about how his station in life would have made it unlikely for him to possess some esoteric knowledge, by pointing to errors he made, which were unlikely to be made by someone who did possess such knowledge.
Thank you. Anderson’s book is a very detailed, readable, and well documented biography of Edward de Vere which shows much (not all) of the huge circumstantial evidence linking De Vere to the authorship. Much of his scholarship appears new. It was there that I first learned of “Fisher’s Folly”, a London house owned by De Vere which became a boarding-house for many young writers. Anderson doesn’t discuss my “collaboration hypothesis” but Fisher’s Folly might have helped De Vere hone his writing skill or find collaborators.
I asked Dopers to read that book before debating the authorship because in these discussions it is very obvious that many participants have made little effort to understand the case for De Vere. Indeed, they get much of their information about the case from “debunking” works like Shapiro’s, which is more about inventing motives for Oxfordians than examining their case.
I agree with the comment you included about the Sonnets. Some of them have an almost uncanny appropriateness if one assumes De Vere wrote them anonymously, but seem bizarre when related to what is known about the man from Stratford. One of the first threads I started at SDMB listed some specific sonnets and asked for a discussion of their bearing on the authorship controversy. The thread got long but there was ZERO interest in even looking at any Sonnet; they were dismissed with comments like
Doper interest in that thread revolved around insulting septimus, e.g.
I don’t argue with truthers or birthers because I’ve never looked at their “evidence.” If I did argue with them I’m sure I’d be very dismissive despite my ignorance. The authorship controversy gives me a reverse sympathy for conspiracy theorists. 
I’m far from certain that Oxford wrote the Sonnets and plays – I regard it as an intriguing mystery. But anyone who lumps “Oxfordians” with birthers and truthers is showing their own ignorance.
Not mine! I was trying to explain what Joe Sobran said in his book.
I have read extensively about de Vere. Before that I read of the similar theories using similar “proof” to show that Bacon wrote Shakespeare. And others.
There are probably 50 candidates for the honor, and the ones I have read about have proponents who use necessarily similar circumstantial and incredibly cherrypicked evidence to heap up piles of positives without properly considering the negatives. This is not history, or logic, or science, or argument.
I find it incredibly telling that virtually every non-Stratfordian - which is the term in use, so I can’t understand how it’s “precious” - comes from outside the academic community of English scholars and virtually every English scholar dismisses them out of hand. It’s similar to the state of climate change research, except possibly the percentages are even higher than the 97% of academics normally bruited about in discussion about climate.
I’ve been reading about this issue for probably 30 years. It is my considered opinion that there is less chance of anyone other than Shakespeare being the author of those works than there is that climate change is not man-made. There is 0% chance that truthers and birthers are correct, so this is somewhat less certain. But not much. I’d put the percentage at far less than 1%. Compare that as you will.
What’s scandalous is the method of argument is remarkably similar to those of conspiracy theorists. Even if I hadn’t done the research I’d recognize the bad thinking for what it is. Nothing - and here I do use 0% - can be true when backed with conspiracy thinking logic. Anyone who understands that can spot the thinking from a quick study without deep knowledge of the subject. It’s like a poker tell written in neon. And it’s all over Oxfordian thought.
Commoners is easier. Less complicated. Any nobleman or gentleman would know all about them. The reverse is not necessarily true.
Right. And the “Oxfordians” aren’t snobs. Sure.
But why link him to the authorship?
You may well be able to argue that, if Shakespeare is not Shakespeare, then de Vere is clearly the writer, but that’s only if Shakespeare isn’t Shakespeare. Before even getting into alternate candidates, why believe an alternate candidate is necessary?
Pretty strong case for William Shakespeare writing the plays attributed to him. De Vere simply wasn’t anywhere near as good a writer. Uneducated man writing that well? How about Abraham Lincoln? Self-taught man that is one of the few writers to ever write comparably to Shakespeare.
Now, I have a fun little theory that Elizabeth Tudor may have in fact been the writer of the plays, as she would in fact need a “front”. She was that good a writer, read some of her stuff. She left her notes and drafts with Bill, and he continued putting them out and working on the remainder after Liz I died. Do I really believe that? No, but it is a lot more plausible than De Vere. De Vere was a mediocre writer by comparison to Shakespeare. Spencer was as good, but his writing was so different that it isn’t plausible.
Admittedly I have not read Anderson’s book. Though I have watched a few clips of him on youtube when I first became interested in the subject. From what I know of the Oxfordian case regarding the Sonnets is that they have to invent add ons to Oxford’s life for them to fit - an example being they argue Oxford was in love with the Earl of Southampton etc. The only way they uncannily fit into Oxford’s life is by making various assumptions about his life. Assumption which have little basis in hard evidence. With Shakespeare we have at least two or three sonnets which fit his known biography well. The rest lie in the mind of a poet.
To be honest little of this type of evidence is of little interest to me. Far too much of it relies upon interpretation and assumption. As has been stated by others, these interpretations and assumptions can be used to attribute the authorship to many others of the period.
Shakespeare-as-author was very renowned in London at least a decade before his death; about half a decade after his death his fame was so great that closets and attics were scoured for any letters or other artifacts that had bearing on this great wrtier. Let’s look at the score:
[ul][li] Relatives of Shakespeare known to have written or said anything implying their famous writer was even a writer: ZERO.[/li][li] Stratford neighbors of Shakespeare commenting on his talent or even affirming his career in the theater: ZERO.[/li][li] Books owned by, or manuscripts attributed to, Shakespeare: ZERO[/li][li] A minor government official prepared “who’s who” and yearbooks for Stratford. Mentions of the playwright: ZERO[/li][li] Shakespeare had a literate son-in-law with many letters preserved who commented on the talents for poetry of other Stratfordians. Mentions of his father-in-law’s poetry: ZERO[/li][li] Positive evidence that Shakespeare even went to school: ZERO[/li][li] The Earl of Southampton is assumed to be Shakespeare’s patron; a rumor even developed that he had given the poet £1000 very early in his career, a very large sum. Evidence from Southampton or his family or retainers that they had any relationshop with Shakespeare: ZERO. (Oddly, De Vere received an annual allowance of £1000, itself very unusual, from Queen Elizabeth.)[/li][li] The London and Stratford personae differ. At the time Shakespeare-the-author was allegedly writing King Lear and being praised for generosity, the William Shakespeare of Stratford who operated a butcher shop was being accused of grain hoarding, and sueing a customer to recover a two-shilling debt.[/li][/ul]
Obviously documents are lost to fire and flood and one might expect very few useful documents to survive. But the scouring for documents related to Shakespeare began within a decade of his death and has turned up … ZERO items to refute a hoax theory.
Most of the evidence trotted out to “prove Shakespeare was the writer” are fully consistent with a hoax theory. Indeed the famous “Upstart crow” early mention is specifically consistent with the claim that Shakespeare was putting his name on others’ work.
Shakespeare poems and quartos published before 1604 either bear a preface by “Shake-speare”, or carry a notation like “newly revised by the author.” In 1604 such publications cease; when they resume they carry only indirect mentions of the author. The first quarto to appear after 1604 (De Vere’s death year) carried the preface “A never writer to an ever reader” – a peculiar phrase which has no plausible explanation beyond the Oxfordian suggestion: “Shakespeare” never wrote; Ever is an anagram of Vere.
This is all from my vague memory, and only scratches the surface of alleged evidence. I ask those with sincere interest to review on-line arguments or read Anderson’s book before engaging me in a nit-picking debate detail-by-detail.
Except for his name, right there on the plays. 
Without going into your entire post I will ask you one question to start off with. What evidence do you have that half a decade after Shakespeare’s death closets and attics were scoured for any of his letters or artifacts? I could query other parts of your post. However, your first sentence seems so inaccurate imo that I think it worth highlighting in a single post. Any evidence for this early hunt of his “letters or other artifacts”.
By “artifacts” I sincerely hope you don’t mean playscripts. If so, it is a deliberately sloppy use of the word “artifacts”. The choice of this word I assume you are taking from elsewhere.
This is the same sort of stuff that gets trotted out every time. It’s pretty simple. If I can’t count the positive evidence of Shakespeare’s authorship, I’m sure as hell not going to count imagined authorship by someone else.
So, we’re in agreement that neither of you have invested even a smidgen of effort in understanding the “hoax” hypothesized by Oxfordians; indeed even seem to lack the understanding that could be gleaned by looking up “hoax” in a dictionary.
As I say: Read Anderson’s book, or otherwise familiarize yourself with the case; then come back.
ETA: I realize some people find the whole “hoax” hypothesis far-fetched. Then focus your queries on why some don’t find it far-fetched. But to object to other links in the case by rejecting any hoax, is circular.
If people keep rejecting your premise, maybe it’s a sucky premise.
I made no petty, smart assed flippant swipes at you, please don’t take petty, smart assed flippant swipes at me. You said in an above post:
"Shakespeare-as-author was very renowned in London at least a decade before his death; about half a decade after his death his fame was so great that closets and attics were scoured for any letters or other artifacts that had bearing on this great writer.
I asked for any evidence to back this statement up. Since you did not answer I’ll ask it again. Do you have any evidence for your above claim? Specifically any evidence dealing with the emboldened part of your claim would be welcome.
I can imagine a scenario where playscripts were searched for. Playscripts that would help the publishing of the First Folio in 1623. These would then be destroyed over time. This was a very practical matter. Even this scenario may be not entirely accurate. It would depend on how many decent copies of the Plays the Folio publishers could get their hands on. However, your claim is that any artifacts dealing with Shakespeare as a great writer were searched for not just practical stuff such as an accurate script for publishing. Again, do you have evidence for your claim?
The whole premise of the hoax is circular. Basically it says:
[ol]
[li]There’s not enough evidence that Shakespeare wrote the plays[/li][li]And how could one uneducated man write so much great stuff[/li][li]So someone else wrote the plays[/li][li]Let’s focus on people for whom there’s even less evidence that they wrote the plays[/li][/ol]
Everything else IMO is window dressing. There’s no positive evidence for a hoax. The only evidence offered is that there’s not full documentation on plays with Shakespeare’s name on them. Everything else is smoke and mirrors.
A “Bard of the gaps”?
The problem with arguments like this is that they assume a priori that certain, very narrow, kinds of documentary evidence should exist in order to establish Shakespeare’s authorship, rather than looking at the kind of evidence that does exist for most playwrights of the period. Generally, an author’s name on a title page is considered sufficient to establish authorship of a play, unless there is other evidence that would cast doubt on his authorship, because that is the sort of evidence we typically have. We don’t typically have letters from family members, testimony from neighbors, lists of books owned by the playwrights, surviving manuscripts with the author’s name on them, or anything similar for MOST playwrights of the period. These are not the kind of documents that ordinarily survive. In a few cases, we do have school or university records, but their survival is spotty.
If you’re going to doubt Shakespeare’s authorship on this basis, you also have to doubt John Webster’s authorship, Thomas Heywood’s, Thomas Dekker’s, William Rowley’s, and that of any number of other playwrights. Were they all fronts for noblemen? Or were they simply middle-class playwrights working in an era from which most documents don’t survive, an era when the cult of the celebrity author didn’t exist and playtexts were assumed to be ephemeral?
One of the reasons why you don’t find doubters of Shakespeare’s authorship among legitimate early modern drama scholars is that these people know perfectly well how the theatrical milieu worked, know what kinds of documentary evidence we have about other playwrights from the period, and know that Shakespeare is actually one of the better-documented ones. (We have, in addition to various works published under his own name during his lifetime and shortly after his death, a full list of Shakespeare’s works to date in Francis Meres’ 1599 Palladis Tamia, a manuscript list of plays performed at court in 1604-05 which names Shakespeare as the author of several of the works, and a few one-off mentions of Shakespeare as the author of one or more individual works. These pieces of evidence corroborate each other, and nobody during Shakespeare’s lifetime or for two centuries afterward seems to have found them at all problematic.)
So, who wrote the plays after de Vere’s death? Don’t tell me that there were two writers that good and that neither of them was the man who claimed to be that writer.