Well, I got to say that it made my heart twist to realize that Stevens was one of "those." All those nuts who claim Shakespeare couldn't possibly have actually been Shakespeare seem to share a proclivity to be snitty damn snobs-- intellectual, financial, social, what have you. I hate it that people with liberal values can still be outrageous snobs. Thank you, Mike, for letting us in on the darker side of Justice Stevens. Reading that he harbored that silly belief so exasperated me "I could hardly," as our good buddy Shakespeare wrote, "forebear hurling things."
Thanks for sharing, Mike! Love, Terry -----Original Message----- From: Mike Godwin <mnemo...@gmail.com> To: Shakespeare at Winedale 1970-2000 alums <winedale-l@lists.wikimedia.org>; Shakespeare Winedale <shakespeare-at-winedale-email-l...@googlegroups.com> Sent: Thu, Aug 8, 2019 11:45 am Subject: Re: Justice John Paul Stevens and Charlotte Cushman Note to self: "Oxfordian" not "Oxonian." Gaaah! Mike On Thu, Aug 8, 2019 at 8:48 AM Mike Godwin <mnemo...@gmail.com> wrote: I should add that, for all that I agree with Shapiro's worries about Justice Stevens's embrace of the Earl of Oxford theory-- "When one of the most revered legal minds and leaders of this nation works to legitimate one conspiracy theory, it makes it much easier for lesser minds to do the same with other conspiracy theories (and as a New Yorker, writing as the 10th anniversary of the destruction of the Twin Towers approaches, I am especially sensitive to this). A brief glance at our nation’s political landscape (in which, for example, so many believe that President Obama is not American, and even doubt the documentary evidence of his birth certificate) confirms that conspiracy thinking is not a neutral activity. Like it or not, your public expression of interest in the Oxford question has, to my mind at least, disturbing political implications." --I also find myself in agreement with Stevens's observation that the predilections of the leading Oxonian conspiracy theorist, J. Thomas Looney, tell us nothing at all about the merit (or lack of merit) of his arguments. As Stevens wrote, "The fact that Looney may have despised democracy seems to me to be irrelevant to the validity of any arguments he may have made either casting doubt on Shakespeare’s authorship or supporting the hypothesis that Oxford play a role in writing the plays." That's a sound epistemological point, and it makes me feel a little better about this quirk of Justice Stevens. Mike On Wed, Aug 7, 2019 at 10:32 PM Mike Godwin <mnemo...@gmail.com> wrote: It turns out that the late Justice John Paul Stevens was an Oxonian. (This of course breaks my heart a little bit.) An Unexpected Letter from John Paul Stevens, Shakespeare Skeptic https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/an-unexpected-letter-from-john-paul-stevens-shakespeare-skeptic Here's a podcast about Charlotte Cushman, a 19th-century actress who specialized in playing male roles in Shakespeare:https://www.folger.edu/shakespeare-unlimited/romeo-charlotte-cushman?utm_source=wordfly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=ShakespearePlus7Aug2019&utm_content=version_A&promo= Mike -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Shakespeare at Winedale Email List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to shakespeare-at-winedale-email-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/shakespeare-at-winedale-email-list/CAKFh3H_JLryq4SssDgA5g5Q6qB2RPd%2BpNu3_T4BeW1-co_Z%3Djg%40mail.gmail.com.
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