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Ave Atque Vale - by Gwynneth Bowen The Shakespeare Fellowship was founded at Hackney on 6th November 1922, with the following objects: (1) To unite in one brotherhood all lovers of Shakespeare who are dissatisfied with the prevailing Stratfordian orthodoxy, and who desire to see the principles of scientific historical criticism applied to the problem of Shakespearean authorship. (2) To encourage and to organize research among parish registers, wills, and other documents likely to throw light on the subject. Later the objects were revised. No. 1 remained intact, but No. 2 became: To organize research work among sixteenth and seventeenth century manuscripts and encourage literary work of all kinds towards the further elucidation of the problem of authorship; with special consideration of the claims that Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, in sympathetic association with others personally connected with him, was the poet Shakespeare. The Shakespeare Fellowship was not, at its inception, an entirely “Oxfordian” society. The first President was Sir George Greenwood, K.C, author of The Shakespeare Problem Restated, etc., who remained negatively Anti-Stratfordian. The Vice-Presidents included Professor Abel Lefranc, author of Sous Le Masque de William Shakespeare: William Stanley VI le Comte de Derby (1919) as well as J. Thomas Looney, author of Shakespeare Identified in Edward de Vere the Seventeenth Earl of Oxford (1920). The Secretary-Treasurer was an Oxfordian, Col. B. R. Ward, author of The Mystery of Mr. W. H. (1923), and the Committee included Lt.-Col. M. W. Douglas, author of The Earl of Oxford as “Shakespeare” (1931), who was inclined to the belief that the plays were written by a group or committee, with Oxford as the Master-Mind. The Baconians were also represented. As time went on, the Fellowship became progressively more Oxfordian, but it was never exclusively so, and Object No. 1 has never been rescinded. Object No. 2 (in either form) deals with research, and a great deal of original research was done in the early days, particularly by Col. B. R. Ward and his son, Capt. B. M. Ward, author of The Seventeenth Earl of Oxford (1928) --the first and, so far, the last Life of Edward de Vere to be published. But research, important as it is, is not everything. Facts must be coordinated and explained as well as discovered, and the next phase of development was concerned with the comparative study of the plays of “Shakespeare” and the historical events of the time. Rear-Admiral H. H. Holland, Percy Allen and Mrs. Eva Turner Clark (U.S.A.) all published books dealing with topical allusions. Canon G. H. Rendall and Gerald Phillips both wrote on the Sonnets in connection with the life-story of Edward de Vere.
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About the Book
Few are aware that the true identity of William Shakespeare represents Western Civilization’s greatest mystery. Even fewer realize that the commonly accepted authorship of William Shaksper of Stratford, who was illiterate, is a complete hoax manufactured by England’s most powerful politicians.
The hoax survived largely unscathed until 1920 when J. Thomas Looney’s brilliant book, “Shakespeare” Identified, plucked Edward de Vere out of historical obscurity and introduced him to the world as the real Shakespeare. Fighting the astonishing power of Conventional Wisdom, de Vereans have steadily built their case through solid research in the past ninety years.
This book series salvages fascinating, neglected authorship material which repeatedly and convincingly shows that Edward de Vere was the uniquely creative genius who wrote under the coerced pen name of William Shakespeare.
About the Author
Dr. Paul Altrocchi graduated from Harvard University and Harvard Medical School. After retiring from neurology in 1998, he has devoted himself to Shakespeare authorship research, publishing more than twenty scholarly papers as well as a biography of Edward
de Vere. Altrocchi lives in Hawaii and has five daughters.
Hank Whittemore, author of eleven books and hundreds of articles, has received two Emmy Awards. Widely published on the Shakespeare authorship question, his major scholarly work, The Monument, provides compelling new evidence that Edward de Vere was William Shakespeare. Whittemore and his family live in Nyack, New York.