Anne Shakespeare: Another Digression
Last blog I started to talk about my next book which is going to look at Anne Shakespeare’s core beliefs (as I see them) of love, nature, free will, and humanism (and religious beliefs). These are all filtered through Anne’s feminine voice. And why not? Here we have the (possibly) greatest female writer of all time writing under the guise of her husband, William Shakespeare in order to immortalise him. But what has to be written (other than the total re-write of all literary criticism, now having to take into account that it is a female writing, not a male) is the tragic tale of both William and Anne. Here is a (rather long) quote from the Preface of my new book,
“I regard both Anne and William as tragic figures. Why? For William it is much easier to understand because he was not the true author of the works attributed to him. Therefore, his tragedy is bound to the fact that he was not the true author; he was playing in a charade, pretending to be the author, and knowing full well that he did not have the ability to do what Anne was doing for him. Thus, he turned to what he could do best; concentrate on business deals and be the “lady’s man” (playing on his reputation as the author, no doubt). However, he must have been full of resentment in that he did not only have the talent to write to the extent that his wife could, but also that he had to play his part in the on-going charade that saw him as the author (and how it must have riled him to be accorded that honour by others knowing full well the deception he was undertaking). On the other hand, perhaps the more tragic of the two is Anne herself. On the superficial level she spent her whole life (and talent) in ensuring that William would be the one recognised as being the author. But more intimately tragic was how she saw her works, her philosophy of life changing before her eyes; from being that young idealist travelling Europe (and Italy in particular) immersing herself in the humanist project and believing that the world was, perhaps, on the verge of a new awakening of which her art, writing, would be one of the leading lights blazing the pathway toward a more humane and equal society. And then, over the course of her writing career, seeing that flame slowly being extinguished. And her only recourse of action was through her writing. That is, we should not see Anne’s plays, poems and Sonnets as some sort of pure enlightened pieces of writing upholding the humanist projects attempt to “educate” people, to create an equal and just society through the sheer power of art. What Anne came to realise over the course of her writing was that the humanist project and practice was slowly being eroded through the forces arraigned against it such as rising capitalism, changes in religious institutions, the failure of the monarchy to provide for all of its citizens, war, the (still) grasping for power and wealth even though the old feudal system was near complete collapse, the new entrants, the nouveau riche, were ruthlessly accumulating wealth and political power. And Anne could only look on in despair and sadness as the old humanist project lost its energy and direction and became more of a millstone than a call to arms (overtaken by the rising bourgeoisie). Perhaps more importantly for Anne’s sense of this failure of the humanist project came to be seen first-hand in her writing in that her plays and poems did not lead to any major changes, did not change history; society was just as corrupt, just as unequal and inhumane despite her best efforts to “educate” the public or to guide benevolent monarchs. And even those who professed to be enlightened through having a wide education and of having read widely in the classics did not translate into them becoming paragons of virtue; even the “professors” of the universities were still fallible human beings, subject to the same temptations and vices of the uneducated. Perhaps her greatest legacy will not be that she changed the world, but rather through her plays and poems she provides an explanation as to why civilisation will continue to make the same mistakes; her characters are not new, but they do represent who we are – our essential nature, as she noted in sonnet 53, ‘What is your substance, whereof are you made’ (l. 1). And while she is talking about William, it could easily be extrapolated to include all of humanity. Was Anne to become a stoic? To “grin and bear” her burdens, and like Hamlet she may well have cried,
To be or not to be, – that is the question –
Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? (Hamlet, III, 1, ll. 56-60)
Her three greatest burdens were, firstly, her relationship with the one person she was totally devoted to for most of her life, William, a relationship that could be characterised as bordering on domestic abuse and coercive control. Her second burden can best be seen as her going unrecognised and unrewarded for her writing, and to go to her grave unknown. Her third burden was her increasing disillusionment with the humanist project; a project she initially strongly believed in but which she increasingly came to see as failing in its endeavours. Did she also come to see that “high” art could not prevent barbarism, war, or lift society up to attain equality and justice?”
However, this tragic aspect of both Anne’s and William’s life is not the major focus of the book. Rather it is Anne’s core beliefs.
More to come.
