# Shakespeare's birthday **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 9, 1999, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676 "1999-11-09T02:41:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 1999, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/21 "1999-11-12T06:55:00Z")
Pluto, take your anti-Stratfordian shit to Great Debates. I see enough of it on humanities.lit.authors.shakespeare. There is _no_, repeat _no_ reason to doubt that the plays that _everyone_ said positively to have been written by William Shakespeare were written by William Shakespeare. In the 150 years that this dreck has been spouting from the mouths of loonies (Delia Bacon, who started it all, died in a madhouse), no one has yet to find one tiny speck of contrary evidence. None. Zero. Zip. Nada. It apparently offends some people that Shakespeare was middle-class. Guess what? So was almost every other writer who ever lived. That infamous PBS webpage contains at least one outright, deliberate lie (the forged “quote” from Puttenham, made by joining together words from two sentences several chapters apart), and most of the rest of it is meaningless hand-waving and woo-woo noises. They should be ashamed of themselves for supporting this complete and utter crap. For the truth of the matter, see [http://www.clark.net/pub/tross/ws/will.html](http://www.clark.net/pub/tross/ws/will.html) . ## As to the original issue of Shakespeare’s birth date, it is conventional to use the Julian Calendar for those whose lives were lived entirely under that calendar, as Shakespeare did, seeing that England did not change until 1752. For those whose lives crossed the transition (like George Washington), the problem is more difficult. (One question to ask is whether we know the individual’s own preference.) John W. Kennedy “Compact is becoming contract; man only earns and pays.” – Charles Williams ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_J_Cunningham)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 1999, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/22 "1999-11-11T22:25:00Z")
This really should be a separate question, but since everyone on this thread is interested in Shakespeare, I might as well pose it here. William Shakespeare is unquestionably the greatest writer in the history of the English language, but how well does he compare to other languages? Might Lope de Vega be just as good a playwright, except that English readers don’t see much of his plays in translation? And how does Shakespeare’s poetry and prose appear to non-English speakers who only see the Bard’s work in translation? ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_J_Cunningham)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 1999, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/23 "1999-11-11T22:29:00Z")
Incidentally, I posted an authorship debate thread in the Great Debates forum, for anyone who wants to slug it out there… * * * “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way…” –Jessica Rabbit, **Who Framed Roger Rabbit** ---
**Author:** ![heretic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/46a35a/32.png) [@heretic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heretic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 1999, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/24 "1999-11-11T23:24:00Z")
Anti-Stratfordianism is on the same level as Danikenthought, and I’d never touch a “great debate” about authorship. There isn’t one. The Oxfordians, like last century’s Baconistas, are posing non-existent questions in order to answer them with their too-clever-by-half conjecture. Snobbery has a lot to do with it; they’re quick to say that William Shakespeare was “illiterate” or “uneducated”. They then try to discredit Shakespeare further by calling him “the man from Avon” or some other sneering, patronising epithet. Then they fondly imagine that there is now a mystery about Shakespeare’s real identity, et voila! They produce some twit and come up with spurious reasons, word games and other idiocies, fooling themselves into thinking that the stupid acrostics they generate outweigh the other evidence, like the deaths of their putative authors. There is no debate. There is no question. There is nothing except the dick-waving of a bunch of stuck-up, elitist MENSA-type snobs. ben ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_J_Cunningham)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 1999, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/25 "1999-11-12T00:11:00Z")
Watch it! I’m a Mensan myself, and I believe William Shakespeare of Stratford-Upon-Avon wrote those plays. Why on Earth would someone write plays under the pseudonym of a real playwright? It makes as much sense as me writing plays under the name “Neil Simon.” * * * “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way…” –Jessica Rabbit, **Who Framed Roger Rabbit** ---
**Author:** ![heretic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/46a35a/32.png) [@heretic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heretic)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 1999, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/26 "1999-11-12T00:35:00Z")
Oxfordianism, like Mensa, is a Cult of the Entitlement of the Underachieving Snob. Not an individual attack by any means; I’ve met and corresponded with quite a few Mensans whose only failing was their membership of Mensa. When a felon’s not engaged in his employment Or maturing his felonious little plans His capacity for innocent enjoyment Is just as great as any honest man’s ben ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Edward\_J\_Cunningham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_J_Cunningham)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 1999, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676/27 "1999-11-12T00:44:00Z")
Were that my only failings in life boiled down to the Mensa membership card in my wallet… (I may be underachieving, but I am **NOT** a snob!) * * * “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way…” –Jessica Rabbit, **Who Framed Roger Rabbit** [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-birthday/4676.md?page=1)