Oberon Shakespeare Study Group

Dennis McCarthy, subject of North by Shakespeare by Michael Blandings In his book North by Shakespeare: a Rogue Scholars Quest for the Truth behind the Bard's Work (Hachette Books, March 30, 2021) Dennis McCarthy’s biographer, Michael Blanding lends his journalistic skill and authorial brilliance to creating a work capable of focusing public attention on the travesty of the Stratfordian attribution of Shakespeare’s work. Blanding chronicles the travail of McCarthy's delivery of Sir Thomas North (1535-ca1604) as the original author of Shakespeare's plays. In the process, Blandings'  book brings to public attention three important Shakespeare authorship criticisms that anti-Strats have always known were Stratfordian deal-breakers: The Stratfordian-centered dating of the plays is wrong. The plays are based on erudite understanding of multiple classical sources inaccessible to the Stratfordian candidate. The success of the Stratfordian candidate is based on tradition, not

The entire Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship spring symposium "The Shakespeare Attribution: Information, Misinformation, and Changing Opinions"   is available now on the SOF YouTube channel at "SOF Spring International Online Symposium 2021" .   Hosted by Earl Showerman, MD in Seattle and Cheryl Eagan-Donovan, MFA in Boston; the free-to-the-public, live event was held on the Zoom platform on April 10, 2021. An international list of presenters included Kevin Gilvary, PhD and Julia Cleave, MA in the UK; James Warren in Thailand; Michael Dudley, MLIS MCP   in Manitoba; and Roger Stritmatter, PhD and Dorothea Dickerman, JD in the US.  Tom Regnier Veritas Award SOF webmaster Jennifer Newton was named the first recipient of the  Tom Regnier Veritas Award  created by the SOF board in memory of former SOF president Tom Regnier, JD LLM who served as SOF president from 2014-2018, and who passed away of complications from Covid-19 on April 14, 2020. Newton was honored in recogniti

James A. Warren James Warren, retired diplomat and 2020 Oxfordian of the Year, presented "The Oxfordian Movement and Academia" at the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship's virtual spring symposium "The Shakespeare Attribution" on April 10, 2021.  Warren's discussion is available on the SOF YouTube channel under the title, "SOF Spring International Online Symposium 2021" . Warren's presentation is introduced at minute 33:48. In his talk Warren gave an overview of his perspective on the status of the Shakespeare authorship question informed by his six-year study of the history of the Oxfordian movement following the publication of J.T. Looney's Shakespeare Identified in 1920. Warren identifies institutional resistance as the last bastion of Stratfordian defense and suggests recruiting natural allies -- historians, for example -- as one way to breach the walls of academe. “There needs to be a civil war take place in Shakespeare studies,” Warren sai

  Michael Dudley, MLIS MCP Michael Dudley, MLIS MCP -- Community Outreach Librarian at the University of Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada -- presented "The Stratfordian Belief System, Epistemic Injustice, and Academic Freedom" at the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship's virtual spring symposium "The Shakespeare Attribution on April 10, 2021. Dudley's discuss is availabe on the SOF YouTube channel under the title, "SOF Spring International Online Symposium 2021" . Dudley's presentation is introduced at hour 01:03:44. In his presentation, Dudley argued that ". . . by calling [authorship] skeptics "conspiracy theorists" and comparing them to Holocaust deniers rather than addressing the substance of their claims, orthodox Shakespeare academics risk committing acts of epistemic vice, injustice and oppression, as well as foreclosing productive lines of inquiry in their discipline." By categorizing the errors of the academy, Dudley's work gi

  We are pleased to welcome longtime Oberon member Tom Townsend as a guest blogger with his article "Is Shakespeare a Pseudonym?" L. Theil           Oberon member Thomas L. Townsend of Seattle, WA Is Shakespeare a Pseudonym? by Thomas L.Townsend This is not as preposterous a question as we’ll soon see: Thomas Vicars (c1590-c1641), was an early Jacobean vicar, who received a B.A. and subsequently an M.A. after attending Oxford University. (Note 1) Both degrees concentrated in Classical Languages, Greek and Latin.   He became a Vicar. To be clear, all vicars in early Jacobean England were in a difficult position, just as they had been in the Elizabethan era. All vicars, of course, were required to be completely honest all the time. This was not simply a matter of conscience but had also been mandated by the late Queen Elizabeth I. (Note 2) Further, vicars were required to answer to the Ecclesiastic Court. Here’s the situation: The Ecclesiastic Court reported directly to king Ja