James A. Warren – Building An Oxfordian Library

A preview of twelve volumes (containing more than twenty books and more than 130 articles) from the first quarter century of the Oxfordian era (1920-1945) that I plan to bring back into print over the coming year. First to be published will be a seven-volume set of the complete Shakespeare writings of Percy Allen, the most important Oxfordian scholar after Looney himself. For all volumes I'll explain why these books are still important for the Oxfordian movement today as we work to establish Edward de Vere as the principal author of Shakespeare's works.

James A. Warren is the author of Shakespeare Revolutionized: The First Hundred Years of J. Thomas Looney's "Shakespeare" Identified, and the editor of the Centenary edition of Looney's book. He has given presentations at several Oxfordian conferences and was named the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship's Oxfordian of the Year in 2020. He is retired from the U.S. Foreign Service.

[richardwaugaman]

Jim Warren is extraordinarily prolific and scholarly in getting Oxfordian publications back in print, and in compiling periodic bibliographies. We are all in his debt.

[duncanmckeown]

I've got vol.4 of the Percy Allen collection! Well worth getting, with nuggets of information that I have not seen elsewhere.

[duncanmckeown]

The little "band of brothers" (and sisters!) is beginning to grow both in the amount of scholarship and the numbers of converts (among whom I count myself!) Once more unto the breach dear friends!

[johnbeattie]

Jim this is superb work!

Note, as background, from 6:55-7:25...the authorship candidates whom Gilbert Slater discusses in his 1931 essay The Seven Shakespeares are Edward de Vere (who gets the nod), Francis Bacon, Mary Sidney Herbert, William Stanley, Christopher Marlowe, Roger Manners, and Sir Walter Raleigh.

[rooruffneck]

It is probably more likely that Jonson's scene is better grasped as a New Yorker comic than the description of a literal interaction between the Queen, de Vere, and Shaksper.

[albert_lucientes]

After reading Ogburn's book, I've never looked back. I have read Bloom's and Schoenbaum's _biographies_ on Shaksper, hoping for a more compelling case. What one finds is a lot of speculation. As a layperson with no horse in this race whatsoever, it strikes me as farcical at this point to continue to pretend that the Stratford man could have been the author. If that were the case, one would think he would have been recognized as such during his lifetime, and most certainly upon his death. Neither of which happened. This could easily be the end of the story. But then, of course, there is a mountain of continually growing other circumstantial evidence that all points to Edward de Vere. Who was it that (mostly like, based on that the book is dedicated to them, the "incomparable pair of brethren") paid to publish (and thus had access to all of the hitherto unpublished works that appeared for the first time in the 1623 _first folio?_ Philip Herbert (husband of Susan de Vere -Edward de Vere & Anne Cecil's youngest child) and his older brother William. - The case is so incontrovertible, and can be argued from so many different perspectives, that it seems absurdly obtuse to continue to pretend otherwise. And, what do we hear in response to cogent arguments made by the _Oxfordians?_ Mostly derision & ad hominem, aimed both at anyone that would dare question the conventional attribution (despite there being so many valid reasons to do so) and at the man himself. This, imho, speaks volumes for the paucity of their position.

[caststagemysteries]

It's interesting that William Shaksper would have gone to an audience with De Vere and the Queen. It's like Shaksper was one of our presidents/Prime Ministers of today.

[patricktilton]

Ha ha! I can easily imagine Oxford playing a joke on the Queen, presenting Shakspere as a gentleman actor who is supposedly only PLAYING the role of a yeoman, when in fact Shaksper WAS only a yeoman at the time. It would be a variation on the Induction scene prefacing TAMING OF THE SHREW, where the joke is on Christopher Sly, who is dressed in gentlemen's attire while he's passed-out drunk.

Would Oxford have dared to play such a joke on the Queen? I see no reason to doubt it. I also wonder if his gas-passing incident was wholly unintentional. Who doesn't laugh at fart jokes? There are tons of Fart Prank videos on YouTube, all the ones I've seen being hi-LAR-ious -- and, no, I'm not above laughing at a funny fart joke, like the infamous scene in BLAZING SADDLES.

My best friend, when we were teenagers back in the 1970s, did the old "Pull my finger" stunt on his mother -- the first time I had ever seen such a thing -- and her puzzled expression as she began pulling his finger, morphing into a surprised and mildly outraged expression, left me stunned and then laughing at the sheer audacity of it.

Did Oxford PURPOSELY fart in the Queen's presence, knowing he was probably the only person in the royal presence who could get away with such a boorish act, passing it off as an 'accident'? One must wonder at the extent such a dramatist renowned for Comedy would go just to get a laugh from an audience -- even at the Queen's expense. I suspect that he knew Elizabeth well enough that she -- after an initial "We are NOT amused!" reaction -- would eventually see the humor in it and end up rolling on the floor with gales of laughter. Wasn't that rather the job of an "allowed fool" -- to amuse the monarch, as well as to be the one voice she could trust to tell her what all her Yes-men wouldn't dare to say?

I have a bad feeling that I'm going to be spending a hell of a lot of money on these upcoming re-issues of forgotten Oxfordian works by Allen and others. My ducats!

[CulinarySpy]

I wonder is there any chance of someone re-issuing Louis P. Benezet's "Shakspere, Shakespeare and De Vere" (1937)? This book seems to be made of that rare earth element 'Unobtainium'.