Link to a Holger Syme piece.

My newspaper reported a few days ago that the studio have printed up “education packs” for mass distribution to US schools, to aid discussion of the Oxford Theory accompanied by classroom showings of Anonymous.

I lack words to express how depressed it makes me that there are literate functional beings in the world who can couple “education packs” with “Roland Emmerich film” in one sentence without breaking into hysterical laughter.

Just yesterday I heard Stephen Fry (thanks to the wonders of cable TV) claim that Shakespeare has contributed some 3,000 words to the English language. How should we interpret that?

You should interpret it as actor and comedian Stephen Fry being one in the long line of non-experts who love the idea of the English language enough to sing its praises, but not enough to actually learn what it is they are talking about.

I love Fry as an entertainer, but his pronouncements about the English language are crap.

This ("Wouldn’t It Be Cool if Shakespeare Wasn’t Shakespeare?” by Stephen Marche) is also an excellent piece of Shakespeare mythbusting, though dealing with an entirely different sort of myth.

Though I occasionally miss ozzie, I am at present grateful for his absence.

Good lord.  I’m glad that was before my time, and pleased to see aldi (and others) responding so well and so patiently (far more patiently than I would have managed).

Yes indeed, Doc. Good article and a necessary corrective to the idea that Shakespeare was busily coining half the English language while writing his plays. It isn’t the words Shakespeare used, it’s how the guy put them together. I’d take issue with his contention that it was with Coleridge that the elevation of Shakespeare really commenced. Most critics would point to David Garrick’s extravagant Shakespeare Jubilee of 1769 in Stratford-on-Avon as marking the beginning of the apotheosis of Shakespeare. (See Samuel Schoenbaum’s Shakespeare’s Lives for an entertaining description of the speechifying, posturing and assorted lunacies of the three-day event.)

Let me remind you all that discussion of the authorship of Shakespeare’s plays is no longer relevant, since the learned Professor R. Soul Scheisskopf has proved beyond question (applying the infallible analytical techniques of hochkritik) that Shakespeare’s plays were written, not by William Shakespeare, but by another author of the same name.

It’s always seemed to me that even if Shakespeare did provide the first identifiable citation for gazillions of words, that still wouldn’t prove that he coined all or indeed any of them. He might just have been the kind of writer who adores new, fashionable or nonce-words, keeps his ears open for them and reycles his finds into his work. There’s not a shred of reason to revere him as “the man who gave us all this wonderful vocabulary”.

Of course Hollywood never saw a conspiracy theory it didn’t like. My only surprise is that it’s not directed by Oliver Stone.

Anonymous, 2011

A political thriller advancing the theory that it was in fact Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford who penned Shakespeare’s plays; set against the backdrop of the succession of Queen Elizabeth I, and the Essex Rebellion against her.

I imagine Ozzie will be the first in line for this one!

I found this very funny (Stephen Fry showed it). As we recently concluded, one should never forget that there’s an editor behind every written text!

Thanks, Dutchtoo, I’ve always enjoyed Rowan Atkinson’s work.

Shakespeare walks into a bar, and the bartender says, ‘Oi, you can’t come in ‘ere! You’re bard!’”

Later that night...

“We don’t serve faster-than-light neutrinos here,” said the bartender.  A neutrino walks into a bar.

[edit: I forgot to add this, below, and a link]

Student Bloopers:
This is [?really? -sobiest] a collection of actual student bloopers collected by teachers from 8th grade through college.The greatest writer of the Renaissance was William Shakespeare. He was born in the year 1564, supposedly on his birthday. He never made much money and is famous only because of his plays. He wrote tragedies, comedies, and hysterectomies, all in Islamic pentameter. Romeo and Juliet are an example of a heroic couplet. Romeo’s last wish was to be laid by Juliet.

aldiboronti - 25 October 2011 05:27 PM

I imagine Ozzie will be the first in line for this one!

And while standing in that line, he will be arguing about the origin of the word shebang.

Did you see my Marche link above, aldi?

Thank, Dutchtoo. I had just finished prepping a class on Lear when I saw this. I keep forgetting that Hugh Laurie did comedy.