CAN A COMMONER BE A BRILLIANT WRITER?
CAN A COMMONER BE A BRILLIANT WRITER? The supporters of the Earl of Oxford seem to find their strongest support in the belief that the Shakespeare plays must have been written by an aristocrat. (This wikipedia article gives a lot of the arguments.) Justice Scalia agrees with Justice Stevens in support of Oxford and says, “”It is probably more likely that the pro-Shakespearean people are affected by a democratic bias than the Oxfordians are affected by an aristocratic bias.” Justice Stevens compares the belief that a commoner can be such a brilliant writer to a belief in Santa Claus: “a lot of people like to think its Shakespeare because…they like to think that a commoner can be such a brilliant writer,” he says. “Even though there is no Santa Claus, it’s still a wonderful myth.” I think it’s remarkable that the impossibility of a commoner writing brilliant plays is enough to persuade two justices of the United States Supreme Court to believe in what would have been a conspiracy involving a number of people over a period of many years. Anton Chekhov was the son of a serf.