'Counterfeiting' Shakespeare: Evidence, Authorship and John Ford's Funerall Elegye'Counterfeiting' Shakespeare addresses the fundamental issue of what Shakespeare actually wrote, and how this is determined. In recent years his authorship has been claimed for two poems, the lyric 'Shall I die?' and A Funerall Elegye. These attributions have been accepted into certain major editions of Shakespeare's works but Brian Vickers argues that both attributions rest on superficial verbal parallels; both use too small a sample, ignore negative evidence, and violate basic principles in authorship studies. Through a fresh examination of the evidence, Professor Vickers shows that neither poem has the stylistic and imaginative qualities we associate with Shakespeare. In other words, they are 'counterfeits', in the sense of anonymously authored works wrongly presented as Shakespeare's. He argues that the poet and dramatist John Ford wrote the Elegye: its poetical language (vocabulary, syntax, prosody) is indistinguishable from Ford's, and it contains several hundred close parallels with his work. By combining linguistic and statistical analysis this book makes an important contribution to authorship studies. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 77
Page 9
... occur every three syllables , or even every two – ' being set lipps mett ' ( 39 ) – unless we need to make ' lipps ' disyllabic , for metrical reasons . Of the 429 words in this poem , 162 are rhyme - words , which must be some kind of ...
... occur every three syllables , or even every two – ' being set lipps mett ' ( 39 ) – unless we need to make ' lipps ' disyllabic , for metrical reasons . Of the 429 words in this poem , 162 are rhyme - words , which must be some kind of ...
Page 10
... occurs in Troilus and Cressida , in the scene where Pandarus visits Paris , Helen , and their entourage : Pandarus . Fair be to you , my lord , and to all this fair company ! fair desires , in all fair measure , fairly guide them ...
... occurs in Troilus and Cressida , in the scene where Pandarus visits Paris , Helen , and their entourage : Pandarus . Fair be to you , my lord , and to all this fair company ! fair desires , in all fair measure , fairly guide them ...
Page 13
... occurs in ' Shall I die ? ' , and spelled out the implications of this strange avoidance . Once we know that ' the is , far and away , the single most common word in Shakespeare ' , appearing over 29,000 times in his work , ' or just ...
... occurs in ' Shall I die ? ' , and spelled out the implications of this strange avoidance . Once we know that ' the is , far and away , the single most common word in Shakespeare ' , appearing over 29,000 times in his work , ' or just ...
Page 16
... occur in ' Shall I die ? ' and somewhere , in some form , in Shakespeare's works . In listing these parallels Taylor claimed to be dealing with ' quantifiable ... aspects of Shakespeare's style ' , and he certainly quantified his ...
... occur in ' Shall I die ? ' and somewhere , in some form , in Shakespeare's works . In listing these parallels Taylor claimed to be dealing with ' quantifiable ... aspects of Shakespeare's style ' , and he certainly quantified his ...
Page 19
... occur , as does this one , in the midst of a catalogue of physical attractions . ( Spenser , by contrast , although he refers to lips fifty- three times , never calls them ' red ' . ) Even the clichés of the poem are clichés Shakespeare ...
... occur , as does this one , in the midst of a catalogue of physical attractions . ( Spenser , by contrast , although he refers to lips fifty- three times , never calls them ' red ' . ) Even the clichés of the poem are clichés Shakespeare ...
Contents
1 | |
PART I Donald Fosters Shakespearean construct | 55 |
PART II John Fords Funerall Elegye | 261 |
Appendices | 467 |
Notes | 509 |
Bibliography | 554 |
Index | 563 |
Other editions - View all
'Counterfeiting' Shakespeare: Evidence, Authorship and John Ford's Funerall ... Brian Vickers No preview available - 2009 |
'Counterfeiting' Shakespeare: Evidence, Authorship and John Ford's Funerall ... Brian Vickers No preview available - 2002 |
Common terms and phrases
Abrams abstract ascription attribution authorship studies Brian Vickers canon Christes Bloodie Sweat cited critics Cyrus Hoy death Dekker described diction discussion Donald Foster doth dramatist edition editors Elegy Elegye's Elizabethan Elliott and Valenza English essay evidence fair Fames Memoriall figure Ford's plays Ford's poems Foster claimed frequently Funeral Elegy Funerall Elegye Golden Meane hendiadys Henry instances John Ford Laws of Candy linguistic literary Love's Sacrifice Lover's Melancholy mind modern Monsarrat Mountjoy never Noble noun occurs opinion Oxford passage percent Perkin Warbeck phrase poem's poet poet's poetry praise prose published punctuation readers recurs refer Renaissance rhetoric rhyme Richard sample scenes scholars sequence Shakespeare's authorship Sonnets stanza statistics style stylistic Sun's Darling syntactical syntax Taylor tests thee Thomas thou tion usage verb verse line Vickers virtue vocabulary William Peter William Shakespeare Witch of Edmonton words writing wrote youth