Posted on 10/30/2005 2:38:07 PM PST by theFIRMbss
In 16th century England many loyal subjects to the crown were asked to make a terrible choice: to follow their monarch or their God. The era was one of unprecedented authoritarianism: England, it seemed, had become a police state, fearful of threats from abroad and plotters at home. This age of terror was also the era of the greatest creative genius the world has ever known: William Shakespeare. How, then, could such a remarkable man born into such violently volatile times apparently make no comment about the state of England in his work?
He did. But it was hidden. Revealing Shakespeare's sophisticated version of a forgotten code developed by 16th-century dissidents, Clare Asquith shows how he was both a genius for all time and utterly a creature of his own era: a writer who was supported by dissident Catholic aristocrats, who agonized about the fate of England's spiritual and political life and who used the stage to attack and expose a regime which he believed had seized illegal control of the country he loved.
Shakespeare's plays offer an acute insight into the politics and personalities of his era. And Clare Asquith's decoding of them offers answers to several mysteries surrounding Shakespeare's own life, including most notably why he stopped writing while still at the height of his powers. An utterly compelling combination of literary detection and political revelation, Shadowplay is the definitive expose of how Shakespeare lived through and understood the agonies of his time, and what he had to say about them.
Clare Asquith has lectured on Shakespeare in England and Canada. Her article on The Phoenix and the Turtle was published in 2001 by the Times Literary Supplement, and her essay on Love's Labour's Lost appeared this year in Shakespeare and the Culture of Christianity in Early Modern England. She lives in London.
Emerson remarked that Shakespeare put things in his writings that even Shakespeare wasn't aware of. Can't help it.
OK, I'm sold. Thanks for the post.
So, this is basically the Shakespeare Code?
Any deeply engrained conspiracies about the Knights Templar?
No, it's not tin foil
type code, rather she traces
words and phrases that
were commonly used
in Shakespeare's time to refer
to the turbulent
religious conflict
going on around them, and
she just "clues us in"
so that we can share
similar understandings
to the folks back then.
This isn't really new; we studied a lot of this in university back when universities weren't trade schools and/or indoctrination centres. Fascinating when you combine it with a study of the English history of the times. Not allowed today of course. Too many white people involved.....
A few of us freepers believe that it was the 17th Earl of Oxford who penned "Shakespeare’s" plays. There is no proof that Shakespeare the actor wrote plays. In fact, very little is known about this actor. But everyone has the right to believe what ever he/she wants.
The 17th Earl of Oxford was a talented writer. He was an insider to the royal court and knew how it functioned. Shakespeare was not an insider. This is why 17th Earl of Oxford was able to write so impeccably about the machinations of court life.
Why didn’t the 17th Earl of Oxford use his real name? Because it was thought unseemly for royalty to be in this kind of business.
Does that mean that mainstream scholarship has accepted Leo Strauss's discovery of exoteric writing?
No? I didn't think so.
But was he a secret Roman Catholic?
No, he was a Panamanian.
The Lady speaks for herself:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1491244/posts
Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, was your relative’s full name (and title). He was an extremely talented man. He did his share of travelling, especially to Italy. That’s why “Shakespeare” is familiar with a few countries outside of England as one sees in his plays.
OOOPSEE! Traveling with one "l."
I don't see any evidence of that.
I think all writers do. I mean, is there anybody that has 100%, complete self-awareness?
Torpedoes (paraphrased) for the homosexual agenda...
Who is he that is not of woman borne?
Surely, the angel they must serve would have told them that they were borne of woman…
Divinity of Hell! When devils will the blackest of sins put on, they do suggest at first with heavenly shows, as they do now…
They are of a free and open nature, that thinks men honest that but seem to be so, and will as tenderly be led by the nose as asses are…
All of Shakespeare's works had to go under the censor's pen before being allowed on the stage, and if there were buzzwords with easily recognizable anti-Protestant implications then I do not think they would have leaped that hurdle.
Neither do I.
‘Nothing is but what is not.’
No. Emerson pointed that out, that even the master could not conceal his true inside feelings. The heart shows through. In the case of Shakespeare, perhaps a lot is not inadvertent, but he could hardly avoid being of his day.
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