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Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies

How Doubting the Bard Became the Biggest Taboo in Literature

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Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies

By: Elizabeth Winkler
Narrated by: Eunice Wong
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About this listen

 An “extraordinarily brilliant” and “pleasurably naughty” (André Aciman) investigation into the Shakespeare authorship question, exploring how doubting that William Shakespeare wrote his plays became an act of blasphemy…and who the Bard might really be.

The theory that Shakespeare may not have written the works that bear his name is the most horrible, unspeakable subject in the history of English literature. Scholars admit that the Bard’s biography is a “black hole,” yet to publicly question the identity of the god of English literature is unacceptable, even (some say) “immoral.”

In Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies, journalist and literary critic Elizabeth Winkler sets out to probe the origins of this literary taboo. Whisking you from London to Stratford-Upon-Avon to Washington, DC, she pulls back the curtain to show how the forces of nationalism and empire, religion and mythmaking, gender and class have shaped our admiration for Shakespeare across the centuries. As she considers the writers and thinkers—from Walt Whitman to Sigmund Freud to Supreme Court justices—who have grappled with the riddle of the plays’ origins, she explores who may perhaps have been hiding behind his name. A forgotten woman? A disgraced aristocrat? A government spy? Hovering over the mystery are Shakespeare’s plays themselves, with their love for mistaken identities, disguises, and things never quite being what they seem.

As she interviews scholars and skeptics, Winkler’s interest turns to the larger problem of historical truth—and of how human imperfections (bias, blindness, subjectivity) shape our construction of the past. History is a story, and the story we find may depend on the story we’re looking for.

“Lively” (The Washington Post), “fascinating” (Amanda Foreman), and “intrepid” (Stacy Schiff), Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies will forever change how you think of Shakespeare…and of how we as a society decide what’s up for debate and what’s just nonsense, just heresy. Art & Literature Authors Literary History & Criticism World Shakespeare

Critic reviews

“An extraordinarily brilliant and scholarly work, written with an unyielding sleuthing instinct and sparkling with pleasurably naughty moments. This page-turner is mesmerizing.”
—André Aciman, PhD, New York Times bestselling author of Call Me by Your Name
“A fascinating detective story… whose irreverence is part of its appeal.”
—The Guardian
“Elizabeth Winkler is blessed with the clear-eyed wit of a heroine in a Shakespearean comedy. Her undoing of the fools in the forest of the authorship question is iconoclasm As You Like It—joy to behold, lesson for us all.”
—Lewis Lapham, founder of Lapham’s Quarterly
“As a literary-investigative reporter, Elizabeth Winkler… pursues her quarry with tenacity and grips it like a dog with a bone.”
—The Wall Street Journal
“Lively…. Winkler is a crackerjack researcher, deftly laying out the myriad questions, arguments and mysteries swirling around Shakespeare.”
—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post
“Elizabeth Winkler’s Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies is one of the most engaging, riveting, scholarly, and challenging whodunits anyone with an interest in theater, human psychology, literature, and history can hope to read. Following in the footsteps of Henry James, Mark Twain, Mark Rylance, and innumerable other skeptics, Winkler writes about what has been essentially a centuries old theological dispute about the origins of Shakespeare’s astounding body of work like a Shakespearean drama itself: full of complex characters with false reputations and deceptive appearances.”
—Bessel van der Kolk, MD, New York Times bestselling author of The Body Keeps Score
“No, Elizabeth Winkler doesn’t reveal the true identity of the writer Ruth Bader Ginsburg termed “the literary genius known by the name William Shakespeare.” But she does explain how we’ve wound up with, among an army of others, a republican Shakespeare and a monarchist Shakespeare, a Shakespeare who hated his wife and one who loved his, a Shakespeare who wrote all the plays and a Shakespeare who could not write at all. Along her intrepid way, Winkler charts, with refreshing clarity, the much-contested ground underfoot, studded with flinty convictions, gnarled fictions, and a surprising number of land mines.”
—Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Revolutionary
“Fascinating and often delightful…. Shakespeare Was a Woman may represent something of an “emperor’s-no-clothes” moment for academia.”
—Winnipeg Free Press
All stars
Most relevant
I took this all rather lightly, and therefore derived much enjoyment. If like me you think a grammar school boy could well have become a phenomenal dramatist and poet, and that such a poet could well look like a pork butcher, you will not feel the need to elect a replacement for William Shakespeare of Stratford upon Avon. If you find these two eventualities too much to countenance you may be driven to desperately consider some of these unlikely candidates. Prepare for the forcing of fat feet into tiny slippers. Lots of exotic but unfeasible people in a line-up from central casting. Some strange reasoning and important omissions, but a wonderful exploration of our colourful history, human eccentricity and passionate intensity.
I don’t know how the sceptics explain the genius and appearance of the divine George Eliot. She didn’t even make it to grammar school…

Enjoyable and fast-moving.

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A clear sighted and rigorous examination of all the opposing arguments. Her forensic examination is contextualised so that you are able to understand why key players in the debate hold their respective positions. She demystifies the subject, holds the academics to account and allows you to make an informed judgement on who wrote the plays.

Gives a voice to all sides of the debate

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The author, fired by her curiosity and hunger for truth, keeps bumping into experts who have eaten so much from their chosen branch of the Tree of Knowledge that they just seem to have no appetite for anything new. But then there are the other curious ones, comfortable with uncertainty, with whom she finds real connection. Her journey reveals a great deal about human nature. Compelling reading, whatever you think of “Shakespeare’s” actual works.

Compelling

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Certainty over Shakespeare authorship is robustly challenged. However it is the uncertainty that should be embraced which sadly the professional scholars are unable to do regarding it as a threat to their status and reputation. No mention of Sir Thomas North who translated Plutarch Lives and is also a strong contender for the author behind the mask of Shakespeare

Shakespeare dethroned

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I came into this book without an opinion on this topic. It amazed me, kept me curious, and educated me. Despite of the beliefs who was the true Shakespeare, this was a great book to read even just to broaden your own spectrum on the great author.

Tickles your curiousity

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