The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 16.1460 Monday, 5 September 2005
[1] From: Steve Sohmer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Sep 2005 10:44:24 EDT
Subj: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
[2] From: Stefan Andreas Sture <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Sunday, 4 Sep 2005 21:22:07 +0200
Subj: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
[3] From: Jan Pick <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Sep 2005 19:20:18 +0100
Subj: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Steve Sohmer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Sep 2005 10:44:24 EDT
Subject: 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
Comment: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
Dear Friends,
I'm familiar with Clare Asquith's work, both her 'Shadowplay' and her
articles. One cannot encounter these documents without admiration both
for her ingenuity and her scholarship. But she is more polemicist than
scholar. She conveniently overlooks the fact that Shakespeare wrote a
play about the assassination of an absolutist Bishop of Rome ('Julius
Caesar') and in 'Othello' rejects both the cult of virginity and the
doctrine of merit.
There are scores of Catholics in Shakespeare's plays, as there were in
his family and his England. And his texts are dotted with allusions to
defunct Catholic holy days (e.g., the Feast of Saint James the Greater),
rituals (e.g., confession, creeping to the cross, the Holy Saturday
rites), and dogma (e.g., purgatory).
But to infer from these references that Shakespeare was a recusant
Catholic and, indeed, a polemicist for the old religion is to
appropriate him in a way which is inappropriate, given the established
facts of his life and a broad view of his canon. He was remarkably
tolerant. Then again, so was the religious settlement contrived by
Elizabeth, Nicholas Bacon, and Mathew Parker in 1559.
Shakespeare was possessed of a universal sympathy, a quality alien to
conspiracy theorists and polemicists alike. One would like to see an end
to the excesses of the Counter-Reformation.
Hope this helps.
Steve Sohmer
[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Stefan Andreas Sture <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Sunday, 4 Sep 2005 21:22:07 +0200
Subject: 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
Comment: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
I can't help but think of Ozzy Osbourne's comment in the early 80s, when
he was accused of putting backward messages in his songs (worshipping
Satan), he said he had enough trouble making sense the right way.
There's a far cry between Ozzy and Will, I know. But I do deeply believe
that writers wish to make sense and tries to put it right in front of us.
Yours,
Stefan A Sture
http://www.quicktopic.com/31/H/4tmfaY2kjZd
[3]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Jan Pick <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Sep 2005 19:20:18 +0100
Subject: 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
Comment: Re: SHK 16.1452 More Shakespeare Code ...
It always amazes me that some scholars seem to think the Elizabethans
were too stupid to spot all these hidden codes! Frankly, if we were
told that from tomorrow the only state religion in England to be allowed
was Hinduism I think our grandchildren would probably be as aware of the
forms and philosophy of Christianity as William Shakespeare would be of
Catholicism. I heard the author interviewed on R4 with Stanley Wells and
agreed with him that if you set up a theory then work to prove it and
ignore anything that works against it - or as in her case claims it to
be a deliberate anti-stance - it makes for a deeply flawed argument.
Jan
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