Oberon Shakespeare Study Group

View from the Tappan Zee bridge The White Plains SOS/SF authorship conference blew us away with over 20 presenters offering insights into Elizabethan history and authorship issues. Bonner Miller Cutting’s exhaustively researched paper on Shaksper’s will, Frank Davis’ meticulous analysis of Henslow’s diary, and Robert Brazil’s 70-page treatise on Angel Daye’s The English Secretary stand out for me. Yet, despite the fun and fascination of a jam-packed schedule of outstanding presentations, the most exciting aspect of the 2008 SOS/SF conference was the powerful wind that blew through the authorship landscape. We blinked thrice and discovered our Oxfordian island had become a promontory, pointing the way to a brave new view of the world. The new view: Mark Anderson’s keynote insisted that 1604 is the Oxfordian “ace in the hole”. No longer, said Anderson, must Oxfordians whimper apologetically about the unfortunate demise of our hero before all the plays had been written. Turn i...

Mark Anderson and John Plummer, Oct. 11 at the Crowne Plaza hotel in White Plains, NY. Shakespeare by Another Name author Mark Anderson announced Saturday that director/writer John Plummer of the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival has optioned his book. Plummer plans to write a series of scripts based on Oxford's life as revealed in Shakespeare by Another Name to offer networks like PBS and HBO. "Our agents are excited," Plummer said at the joint annual Shakespeare Oxford Society/Shakespeare Fellowship conference in White Plains, NY. "This guy's life (Edward deVere, 17th Earl of Oxford) is the entire Shakespeare canon and it's all true. It's the sexiest story, and it sells itself." For a glimpse of the interaction between Anderson and Plummer, check out this recent entry on Anderson's blog.