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Hi Friends,
Bronchitis has knocked me for a loop for the past few weeks, and I can barely croak out a sentence without my husband yelling, “WHAT??” So it’s a relief to be able to write some thoughts, instead:
A couple of months ago I mentioned that I’m writing a book now that talks about gender discrimination and writing, and hearkens all the way back to Shakespeare. We all know that Shakespeare is hailed as the greatest poet of all time – but what if I told you that the basis of that credential is flimsy at best? If you got my February newsletter I mentioned a few facts about the Bard. There ARE a few things we know, historically, about him – based on actual documents that exist. He was a pretty shady businessman, who evaded taxes (twice) and had a restraining order taken out on him by colleagues. He was fined for hoarding grain during a famine and making folks pay extra for his barley. He married Anne Hathaway after knocking her up. He was a member of an acting troupe, and he eventually became a shareholder in that troupe.
Here's what does not exist, historically: any documentation that says that he wrote or collaborated on any plays. Sure, you’re saying…that was 700 years ago! It’s not like there’s PROOF of that. But, you see, there was. Other playwrights referenced each other. Their names, as authors, are in the ledgers of the theater company owners, who bought the plays. They were lauded publicly at the time of their death by peers. They left behind books and manuscripts in their wills. Moreover, it was common practice back then for playwrights to be meddling in each other’s work all the time. Multiple playwrights revised multiple shows over multiple years. There was no such thing as a copyright or an author “owning” their work. Indeed, until Ben Jonson published the first play folio, playwriting wasn’t even something considered legitimate as a career.
Shakespeare was a glover’s son with a minimal education, which doesn’t exclude him as the author of the plays but does suggest he would have had to educate himself in order to have the vast array of knowledge necessary to write the plays. Yet there is no evidence of this. In fact in his will he left behind many assets (including his second best bed to his wife — I’m telling you, this guy was a real prince, LOL) but not a single book or manuscript. When he died no other poet commented publicly. He was not buried in Poet’s Corner at Westminster Abbey. There are numerous surviving documents that refer to Shakespeare as a businessman or gentleman from Stratford, but not as a poet or writer. For Shakespeare to have written 37 plays alone would not only have been astounding for a working actor – it would have been downright weird.
There are lots of explanations for how the “cult of Shakespeare” and Stratford-upon-Avon became legendary – including a British nationalism for a poet they could coalesce around during WWI when Germans, oddly, decided they loved Shakespeare – but instead of giving that dude any more air time, I would like to introduce you to someone else instead, someone you have probably never heard of.
Her name is Emilia Bassano. She was the first published female poet in England, and little is known about her before she wrote a book called Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum while in her forties.
Let’s backtrack. She was the daughter of an Italian man and his English common-law-wife. Her dad, Baptista, was one of the members of the court recorder musical ensemble for Henry VIII and then Elizabeth I. When he died, Emilia (age 7) was sent as a ward to Countess Susan Bertie, a noblewoman who gave her a remarkable education. When Susan Bertie remarried, Emilia was in limbo a bit, living with Susan’s brother Peregrine Bertie – the ambassador to Denmark. During that limbo year, he had to visit Helsingor Castle (Elsinore) and either Emilia went with him, or was told all about his voyages when he returned. Who’d he meet with on this journey? The Danish King and Queen, the astronomer Tycho Brahe, and Brahe’s relatives – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
Maybe this is a good time to tell you that Shakespeare never went to Denmark.
Back to Emilia. Within a year of that Danish trip, she was given to a man 43 years older than she was to be his mistress. Lord Hunsdon was the illegitimate cousin of Queen Elizabeth, and lonely, because he hated his wife. Emilia, age 13, moved into his lavish home. Hunsdon was in charge of many things – including running all theater in England. Every single play that was performed would cross his desk to be read to make sure that there wasn’t anything treasonous in the content. He would have gone to plays, known all the playwrights, and had access to rehearsals by companies. As would anyone living with him, presumably.
Emilia and Hunsdon lived together for ten years. During these ten years, she was a fixture at court, and would have had access to the lives of nobles in a way that Shakespeare would not. She also was musically accomplished. (There are more musical references in Shakespeare plays than any others, although he did not play an instrument). She would have learned about birds of prey from Hunsdon, who had a falcon as was allowed by his station (also mentioned often in Shakespeare plays although Shakespeare, as a commoner, would not have been allowed to own a bird or prey or likely know the very specific language of falconry used in the plays). Her family had been Jewish and hid their faith in England, but she and her relatives would have a working knowledge of Hebrew and Judaism – also mentioned in Shakespeare’s plays. Her family’s origins in Italy would account for the level of detail in Shakespearean plays about a country Shakespeare did not visit.
In 1593, ten years into her life as a courtesan, she became pregnant. Hunsdon married her off to her cousin, another musician, who squandered all the money the Lord Chamberlain had settled on her. Emilia had a rich, elite education. She could write. She knew the workings of the London theater world and all the players. The only thing she could not do was become a public playwright, because women were not allowed to write for the stage. To do so was morally reprehensible.
Unless, of course, she created content and used someone else’s name on it. A man’s name. Someone, perhaps, who was a fan of making a quick buck - but who wasn’t a writer himself.
Which would mean that Emilia Bassano, who burst into the writing scene seemingly from nowhere with the first published book of poetry by a woman in England — actually had been part of the writing scene all along.
Ask yourself why Shakespeare, who had never been to Italy or spoke Italian, suddenly began writing Italian wedding comedies in 1593. Why he was such a champion of women – intelligent women! – even though he did not teach his two daughters to read or write. Why his plays so often include women who have to be disguised as men in order to be heard.
There is much more to this story (hell, I am forming a whole novel around it!) and there are many other potential authorship candidates who have been proposed — some singular and some in writing clusters. The common thread for those who believe that Shakespeare might have had a bit of help is the belief that he made a business deal to publish under his name, for someone who had to remain anonymous because of gender, status, or political reasons.
But ask yourself if, maybe, scholars have been falling all over each other to justify Shakespeare’s authorship and in doing so have literally edited a potential woman writer out of history.
Now ask yourself if it’s still happening today. Are women’s stories considered as important as men’s? If you see a woman author’s name on a book, is the assumption that she writes romance or women’s fiction or that her books are meant for female readers? If you are a network streaming company, how many popcorn action movies do you buy because you think women will go to them…but think men won’t go to a rom com? On theatrical stages do we see the coming of age stories of young girls, or only young men? For that matter, can you name five musicals that show a healthy, realistic relationship between a mother and a daughter?
Back to my bronchitis: Sometimes laryngitis feels like a metaphor.
I can’t wait for my voice to come back.
XO,
Jodi
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