{"id":1430,"date":"2009-12-22T12:06:00","date_gmt":"2009-12-22T12:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/standingonmyhead\/2009\/12\/catholic-shakespeare-evidence-from-rome\/"},"modified":"2009-12-22T12:06:00","modified_gmt":"2009-12-22T12:06:00","slug":"catholic-shakespeare-evidence-from-rome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/standingonmyhead\/2009\/12\/catholic-shakespeare-evidence-from-rome.html","title":{"rendered":"Catholic Shakespeare Evidence from Rome"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
<\/a><\/div>\n

The literature on Shakespeare being a Catholic keeps mounting. Clare Asquith\u2019s book Shadowplay <\/i>along with the scholarship of Fr.Peter Milward started the ball rolling, then Joseph Pearce\u2019s excellent, The Quest for Shakespeare<\/a><\/i>\u00a0gathered all the evidence together in a rollicking good read and the PBS documentary In Search of Shakespeare<\/i>\u00a0made it visual.<\/p>\n

Now some mysterious evidence has emerged in the Venerable English College in Rome. You can read the article here<\/a>\u00a0and the Times reports here<\/a>.\u00a0They have found some documents that might have Shakespeare\u2019s name on them, indicating that during his \u2018lost years\u2019 from 1585 \u2013 1592 he was in Rome, and if in Rome was he studying for the priesthood? Probably not since the entries are in a guestbook. It could be that if this is Shakespeare, it consolidates other evidence that he remained a Catholic and that he was networking through the Catholic contacts on the continent.<\/p>\n

A leather parchment kept by the college is signed by \u201cArthurus Stratfordus Wigomniensis\u201d in 1585, \u201cShfordus Cestriensis\u201d in 1587 and \u201cGulielmus Clerkue Stratfordiensis\u201d in 1589.\u00a0The college believes these signatures are: \u201c(King) Arthur\u2019s (compatriot) from Stratford (in the diocese) of Worcester,\u201d \u201cSh(akespeare from Strat)ford (in the diocese) of Chester\u201d and \u201cWilliam the Clerk from Stratford\u201d.<\/p>\n

What makes the quest so intriguing is that the evidence for Shakespeare\u2019s life is so scant, and in this particular area it is very scant indeed, but the times were dangerous. To be a Catholic in England was considered an act of treason. Catholics had to disguise their identities. If the names in the register at the English college were cryptic maybe they had to be so that real identities would not be revealed. Walsingham\u2019s spies were infiltrating the seminaries on the continent with fake converts (one of whom was probably Shakespeare contemporary and playwright Christopher Marlowe) Therefore Shakespeare would not only have disguised his name and hometown, but done it differently on three different visits. It\u2019s all very juicy conspiracy theory stuff, and yet that was the situation the Catholics were in. They were members of an underground church. They had to destroy or disguise evidence and \u2018keep it secret keep it safe.\u2019<\/p>\n

As it happens, I\u2019ve produced the outline of a screenplay called The Shakespeare Plot<\/i>. In it Shakespeare is a secret Catholic in Elizabethan England and is all tied up with spies, disguised priests, torture chambers priest\u2019s holes, executions and other juicy stuff. Think Man for All Seasons <\/i>meets Shakespeare in Love. <\/i>Some people in California seem to be interested.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The literature on Shakespeare being a Catholic keeps mounting. Clare Asquith\u2019s book Shadowplay along with the scholarship of Fr.Peter Milward started the ball rolling, then Joseph Pearce\u2019s excellent, The Quest for Shakespeare\u00a0gathered all the evidence together in a rollicking good read and the PBS documentary In Search of Shakespeare\u00a0made it visual. Now some mysterious evidence […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":557,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nCatholic Shakespeare Evidence from Rome<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The literature on Shakespeare being a Catholic keeps mounting. 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