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Tom_of_Assisi
Guest
Was the greatest writer in the history of the English language…no in the history of the world…really a Catholic?
What sayest thou?:clapping:
What sayest thou?:clapping:
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Lonevoice
Guest
Well, I don’t think that anyone has come right out and said yes or no, historically speaking, but I lean toward Yes. There’s certainly enough Catholic references through his works, especially in plays like Romeo and Juliet, and Much Ado About Nothing.
In Shakespeare’s day, Catholics could be and were fined, imprisoned, and sometimes killed for the public practice of their religion. If he WAS a Catholic, he was a recusant( a person who refused the authority of the C of E.) and practiced his faith out of the public eye.
According to a short bio I read about him once, his mother was from a fairly prominent Catholic family, and he was taught by Catholic teachers as a child.
Having said all that, again, I lean toward yes. (I wish you’d included an “I’m not sure” category.)
In Shakespeare’s day, Catholics could be and were fined, imprisoned, and sometimes killed for the public practice of their religion. If he WAS a Catholic, he was a recusant( a person who refused the authority of the C of E.) and practiced his faith out of the public eye.
According to a short bio I read about him once, his mother was from a fairly prominent Catholic family, and he was taught by Catholic teachers as a child.
Having said all that, again, I lean toward yes. (I wish you’d included an “I’m not sure” category.)
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raphaela
Guest
Yes, but Romeo and Juliet was set in Italy which is predominalty catholic, or was at the time. It could have just been good research on the author’s part…
I thought he was anglican, but I could be wrong.
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Tom_of_Assisi
Guest
I despise “I’m not sure” categories.Having said all that, again, I lean toward yes. (I wish you’d included an “I’m not sure” category.)
Commit to which choice you think was more likly in your opinion.
If I ended up with two who said he was–two who said he wasn’t–and then 35 “I’m not sures”…I wouldn’t have gained too much insight into the matter…I’m just trying to see how people are leaning.
Thanks a lot for participating however!!!
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Faustina
Guest
I have been wanting to write a book on this very subject.
There is historical documents that show no only Shakespeares mom being from a Catholic family, but his father as well. As a child he was given a Catholic education, and legend has it, he even studied at a seminary. One of his closest friends was a Campion, who was also a very devout Catholic family.
In several of his plays there are Catholic references that are disguised. One that I heard discussed was Hamlets soliquoy (sp)
“to be or not to be”
I find the subject to be particularily fascinating.
There is historical documents that show no only Shakespeares mom being from a Catholic family, but his father as well. As a child he was given a Catholic education, and legend has it, he even studied at a seminary. One of his closest friends was a Campion, who was also a very devout Catholic family.
In several of his plays there are Catholic references that are disguised. One that I heard discussed was Hamlets soliquoy (sp)
“to be or not to be”
I find the subject to be particularily fascinating.
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deogratias
Guest
If he was Catholic, certainly he would have to keep it a secret or face martyrdom. It was early in the Protestant Reformation in his time with eprsecution of Catholics in England. We all may someday be faced with the question of whether to rise up against authority if required and to become a martyr if given the chance. “To be or not to be, that is the question.
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take up arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?”
We know what St. Thomas Moore chose when faced with the question.
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take up arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?”
We know what St. Thomas Moore chose when faced with the question.
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Joe_Kelley
Guest
Whether or not he was a Catholic in later life, he was born into a Catholic culture and grew up in a country which still retained a strong Catholic heritage. This was bound to strongly affect his writings.
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csr
Guest
Part of what drives the hypothesis that Shakespeare was Catholic is the extent to which Catholic views of religion and of our relationship to God infiltrate his plays. (For examples of a discussion of this type, see “How Catholic was Shakespeare?”.) Also fueling this discussion is the evident difficulty in finding an evidence trail for the actual writer: a Catholic, it is thought, would need to be secretive in a climate of rampant Protestantization (so to speak).
However, familiarity with Catholic themes could also be part of the make-up of any well-educated person of that time. A writer committed to good writing does not shy from utilizing themes even though they be alien to his own particular sensibilities. Just a few moments ago, I ran across a hypothesis that a nobleman named Edward de Vere could be the author. He was a man of wide learning, close to government, educated in law, well-traveled, and broadly experienced in many ways sometimes uncannily similar to matter depicted in various plays and sonnets (1). Various reasons are suggested for considering “Shakespeare” to be a pseudonym. And, noblemen were discouraged from writing (2).
De Vere was almost certainly not a Catholic, given how close he was to the corriders of power in Protestant England. His son Henry became a noteworthy Protestant. However, de Vere still benefited from familiarity with Catholic points of view, even if he had no sympathy for them himself. The importance of proximity is evident in the fact that today the Catholic elements of Shakespeare plays often sail right past modern viewers, who consider a decent death one where the family is not too dispersed, who consider decent dress one in which the midriff is not completely exposed–unless one is on the beach, and who consider a decent engagement one in which sex is “practiced” “safely”, and “not right away, of course”.
Of course I don’t claim to know whether Edward de Vere was the author of Shakespeare plays; I am just mentioning the possibility.
However, familiarity with Catholic themes could also be part of the make-up of any well-educated person of that time. A writer committed to good writing does not shy from utilizing themes even though they be alien to his own particular sensibilities. Just a few moments ago, I ran across a hypothesis that a nobleman named Edward de Vere could be the author. He was a man of wide learning, close to government, educated in law, well-traveled, and broadly experienced in many ways sometimes uncannily similar to matter depicted in various plays and sonnets (1). Various reasons are suggested for considering “Shakespeare” to be a pseudonym. And, noblemen were discouraged from writing (2).
De Vere was almost certainly not a Catholic, given how close he was to the corriders of power in Protestant England. His son Henry became a noteworthy Protestant. However, de Vere still benefited from familiarity with Catholic points of view, even if he had no sympathy for them himself. The importance of proximity is evident in the fact that today the Catholic elements of Shakespeare plays often sail right past modern viewers, who consider a decent death one where the family is not too dispersed, who consider decent dress one in which the midriff is not completely exposed–unless one is on the beach, and who consider a decent engagement one in which sex is “practiced” “safely”, and “not right away, of course”.
Of course I don’t claim to know whether Edward de Vere was the author of Shakespeare plays; I am just mentioning the possibility.
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RBushlow
Guest
At that time, there were only two types of Catholics. You were either a “closet” Catholic or a dead Catholic.
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Mike_C
Guest
Or, because he wrote about ancient Roman times, he was an ancient Roman.
I remember the controversy if there was ever a person such as Shakespeare. Some historians debated that it was several people because one person could not have written so many great works in one lifetime.
I remember the controversy if there was ever a person such as Shakespeare. Some historians debated that it was several people because one person could not have written so many great works in one lifetime.
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csr
Guest
I guess one problem with the question, Was Shakespeare a Catholic, is that it is not immune to the problem that we’re not exactly certain who the author really is/was. If we assume or suppose that it was Will of Stratford, as the Cath. Encyc. does, the question can be looked at in terms of known biographical facts, some of which point in both directions. If we assume that there is some correspondence between the nature of the plays and the chosen faith of the author, then we can observe that on the one hand, some of the plays exhibit a more nuanced catholicity that is hard to fake and more likely to be expressed by an adherent, and that on the other hand some of the characters express ideas that excessively point in the opposite direction (this point is noted by the Cath. Encyc. article author, above).
A more interesting issue is the extent to which catholicity opens the plays to greater understanding; of course catholicity opens anything to greater understanding. But even more to the point, to what extent do the plays seem to resonate more, and not be contradicted by, catholicity. I would be interested in reading more about this subject. The April 2002 issue of the St. Austin Review has some articles that explore this dimension. One of the articles, online, discusses the fairies of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in terms of “ontological schizophrenia” that results when a culture abandons “the integrating illuminations of the Christian faith”, arguing that absent a Catholic ontology, the fairies tend to be staged, and regarded by the audience, in hollow ways. This kind of analysis is probably the most fruitful overall. Of course, if we ever can know who Shakespeare really was and what his beliefs were, it would help to understand the plays all the more, especially in relation to more obscure passages. But Shakespeare doesn’t have to be Catholic for Catholicism to be an important component in understanding his works.
A more interesting issue is the extent to which catholicity opens the plays to greater understanding; of course catholicity opens anything to greater understanding. But even more to the point, to what extent do the plays seem to resonate more, and not be contradicted by, catholicity. I would be interested in reading more about this subject. The April 2002 issue of the St. Austin Review has some articles that explore this dimension. One of the articles, online, discusses the fairies of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in terms of “ontological schizophrenia” that results when a culture abandons “the integrating illuminations of the Christian faith”, arguing that absent a Catholic ontology, the fairies tend to be staged, and regarded by the audience, in hollow ways. This kind of analysis is probably the most fruitful overall. Of course, if we ever can know who Shakespeare really was and what his beliefs were, it would help to understand the plays all the more, especially in relation to more obscure passages. But Shakespeare doesn’t have to be Catholic for Catholicism to be an important component in understanding his works.
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csr
Guest
I was looking around for more information about authorship, as it has bearing on the question (If Shakespeare wasn’t Will of Stratford then we may have to re-evaluate quite a lot) and I found some web sites that do what looks to be a pretty good job of refuting any notion that Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford (d. 1604), could have been the man behind the pen. A good website is Shakespeare Authorship (.com). One of the basic elements in the discussion is that Shakespeare’s plays make sense in terms of his development as a writer when seen in the order traditionally suggested; issues like the fraction of end-stopped lines, amount of rhyme, etc., come into play here. Another is that Shakespeare’s knowledge of the continent isn’t really all that spiffing, nor is his use of law all that out of the ordinary for playwrights of the time. “The Tempest” borrows details from events of 1609-10, while De Vere died in 1604. A rather cute summary of the De Vere-Will of Stratford authorship question is on “the place to be”.
As for the connection with Catholicism, or the extent to which catholicity meaningfully informs at least some of the plays, a scholar named Peter Milward has written about this, and he’s not alone. This is different, of course, from insisting that Shakespeare must have been Catholic; as Harold C. Goddard writes in his The Meaning of Shakespeare, “The lawyer believes he must have been a lawyer, the musician a musician, the Catholic a Catholic, the Protestant a Protestant. Never was there a more protean genius” (Vol. I, p. 1). On the other hand, a Catholic sentiment would be hard to fake, and I think most writers would be loathe to fake it.
As for the connection with Catholicism, or the extent to which catholicity meaningfully informs at least some of the plays, a scholar named Peter Milward has written about this, and he’s not alone. This is different, of course, from insisting that Shakespeare must have been Catholic; as Harold C. Goddard writes in his The Meaning of Shakespeare, “The lawyer believes he must have been a lawyer, the musician a musician, the Catholic a Catholic, the Protestant a Protestant. Never was there a more protean genius” (Vol. I, p. 1). On the other hand, a Catholic sentiment would be hard to fake, and I think most writers would be loathe to fake it.
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