莎士比亚——赞誉与质疑并存

 　　在他去世150年之后，关于莎士比亚戏剧原作者的争议接踵而至。学者和文学评论家列出了一系列名字，推断他们为戏剧的真正作者。其中包括克里斯托弗?马洛、爱德华?德?维尔和弗朗西斯?培根，这些人拥有更知名的背景，更具文学水准或灵感更丰富。这一现象大部分是由于对莎士比亚的生平描述得不够详细，而且那一时代的资料来源很缺乏。圣三一教堂和斯特拉福德政府的官方记录记载了威廉?莎士比亚这个人的存在，但是没有一处资料能证实他是个演员或剧作家。

　　怀疑者也质疑，教育背景如此平庸的人却能在莎士比亚的作品里展示出那么敏锐的洞察力和诗歌表现力，到底是如何做到的。几个世纪以来，涌现出了一些团体，他们对莎士比亚戏剧的原作者提出了疑问。

　　最严重、最广泛的怀疑开始于19世纪，那时人们对莎士比亚的崇拜达到了顶峰。批评者认为，对于这个来自埃文河畔斯特拉福德的威廉?莎士比亚，唯一确凿的地方就是，他一开始身份卑微，年纪轻轻就结了婚，后来做房地产生意很成功。莎士比亚牛津学会（成立于1957年）的成员们说，身为牛津第17代伯爵的英国贵族爱德华?德?维尔是“威廉?莎士比亚”诗歌和戏剧的真正作者。牛津学者说德?维尔出身贵族，学识渊博，教育背景深厚，而且他的诗歌与被认为是莎士比亚的作品在结构上很相似。他们主张，威廉?莎士比亚不具备应有的教育背景和文学修养，写不出如此雄辩的散文，也创造不出如此丰富的人物。

　　莎士比亚——赞誉与质疑并存

　　About 150 years after his death, questions arose about the authorship of William Shakespeare's plays. Scholars and literary critics began to float names like Christopher Marlowe, Edward de Vere and Francis Bacon—men of more known backgrounds, literary accreditation¹, or inspiration—as the true authors of the plays. Much of this stemmed from the sketchy² details of Shakespeare's life and the dearth³ of contemporary primary sources. Official records from the Holy Trinity Church and the Stratford government record the existence of a William Shakespeare, but none of these attest⁴ to him being an actor or playwright⁵.

　　Skeptics also questioned how anyone of such modest education could write with the intellectual perceptiveness⁶ and poetic⁷ power that is displayed in Shakespeare's works. Over the centuries, several groups have emerged that question the authorship of Shakespeare's plays.

　　The most serious and intense skepticism began in the 19th century when adoration⁸ for Shakespeare was at its highest. The detractors believed that the only hard evidence surrounding William Shakespeare from Stratford-upon-Avon described a man from modest beginnings who married young and became successful in real estate. Members of the Shakespeare Oxford⁹ Society (founded in 1957) put forth¹⁰ arguments that English aristocrat¹¹ Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, was the true author of the poems and plays of "William Shakespeare." The Oxfordians cite de Vere's extensive knowledge of aristocratic society, his education, and the structural¹² similarities between his poetry and that found in the works attributed to Shakespeare. They contend that William Shakespeare had neither the education nor the literary training to write such eloquent¹³ prose and create such rich characters.

　　However, the vast majority of Shakespearean scholars contend that William Shakespeare wrote all his own plays. They point out that other playwrights¹⁴ of the time also had sketchy histories and came from modest backgrounds. They contend that Stratford's New Grammar School curriculum of Latin and the classics could have provided a good foundation for literary writers. Supporters of Shakespeare's authorship argue that the lack of evidence about Shakespeare's life doesn't mean his life didn't exist. They point to evidence that displays his name on the title pages of published poems and plays. Examples exist of authors and critics of the time acknowledging William Shakespeare as author of plays such as The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Comedy of Errors and King John. Royal records from 1601 show that William Shakespeare was recognized as a member of the King's Men theater company (formally known as the Chamberlain's Men) and a Groom¹⁶ of the Chamber¹⁵ by the court of King James I, where the company performed seven of Shakespeare's plays. There is also strong circumstantial evidence of personal relationships by contemporaries who interacted with Shakespeare as an actor and a playwright.

　　What seems to be true is that William Shakespeare was a respected man of the dramatic arts who wrote plays and acted in some in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. But his reputation as a dramatic genius wasn't recognized until the 19th century. Beginning with the Romantic period of the early 1800s and continuing through the Victorian period, acclaim¹⁷ and reverence¹⁸ for William Shakespeare and his work reached its height. In the 20th century, new movements in scholarship and performance have rediscovered and adopted his works.

　　Today, his plays are highly popular and constantly studied and reinterpreted in performances with diverse cultural and political contexts. The genius of Shakespeare's characters and plots are that they present real human beings in a wide range of emotions and conflicts that transcend¹⁹ their origins in Elizabethan England.

1 accreditation   

n.委派，信赖，鉴定合格

参考例句：

• a letter of accreditation 一份合格证明书
• This paper gives an overview of the Verification, Validation and Accreditation (VV&A) in High Level Architecture(HLA). 对基于高层体系结构(High Level Architecture,简称HLA)的仿真系统的校核、验证与确认(Verification, Validation and Accreditation,简称VV&A)问题进行了详细的介绍及分析。 来自互联网

2 sketchy   

adj.写生的，写生风格的，概略的

参考例句：

• The material he supplied is too sketchy.他提供的材料过于简略。
• Details of what actually happened are still sketchy.对于已发生事实的详细情况知道的仍然有限。

3 dearth   

n.缺乏，粮食不足，饥谨

参考例句：

• There is a dearth of good children's plays.目前缺少优秀的儿童剧。
• Many people in that country died because of dearth of food.那个国家有许多人因为缺少粮食而死。

4 attest   

vt.证明，证实；表明

参考例句：

• I can attest to the absolute truth of his statement. 我可以证实他的话是千真万确的。
• These ruins sufficiently attest the former grandeur of the place. 这些遗迹充分证明此处昔日的宏伟。

5 playwright   

n.剧作家，编写剧本的人

参考例句：

• Gwyn Thomas was a famous playwright.格温·托马斯是著名的剧作家。
• The playwright was slaughtered by the press.这位剧作家受到新闻界的无情批判。

6 perceptiveness   

n.洞察力强，敏锐，理解力

参考例句：

• Her strength as a novelist lies in her perceptiveness and compassion. 她作为小说家的实力在于她的洞察力和同情心。 来自互联网

7 poetic   

adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的

参考例句：

• His poetic idiom is stamped with expressions describing group feeling and thought.他的诗中的措辞往往带有描写群体感情和思想的印记。
• His poetic novels have gone through three different historical stages.他的诗情小说创作经历了三个不同的历史阶段。

8 adoration   

n.爱慕，崇拜

参考例句：

• He gazed at her with pure adoration.他一往情深地注视着她。
• The old lady fell down in adoration before Buddhist images.那老太太在佛像面前顶礼膜拜。

9 Oxford   

n.牛津（英国城市）

参考例句：

• At present he has become a Professor of Chemistry at Oxford.他现在已是牛津大学的化学教授了。
• This is where the road to Oxford joins the road to London.这是去牛津的路与去伦敦的路的汇合处。

10 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

11 aristocrat   

n.贵族，有贵族气派的人，上层人物

参考例句：

• He was the quintessential english aristocrat.他是典型的英国贵族。
• He is an aristocrat to the very marrow of his bones.他是一个道道地地的贵族。

12 structural   

adj.构造的，组织的，建筑（用）的

参考例句：

• The storm caused no structural damage.风暴没有造成建筑结构方面的破坏。
• The North American continent is made up of three great structural entities.北美大陆是由三个构造单元组成的。

13 eloquent   

adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的

参考例句：

• He was so eloquent that he cut down the finest orator.他能言善辩，胜过最好的演说家。
• These ruins are an eloquent reminder of the horrors of war.这些废墟形象地提醒人们不要忘记战争的恐怖。

14 playwrights   

n.剧作家( playwright的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We're studying dramatic texts by sixteenth century playwrights. 我们正在研究16 世纪戏剧作家的戏剧文本。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Hung-chien asked who the playwrights were. 鸿渐问谁写的剧本。 来自汉英文学 - 围城

15 chamber   

n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所

参考例句：

• For many,the dentist's surgery remains a torture chamber.对许多人来说，牙医的治疗室一直是间受刑室。
• The chamber was ablaze with light.会议厅里灯火辉煌。

16 groom   

vt.给（马、狗等）梳毛，照料，使...整洁

参考例句：

• His father was a groom.他父亲曾是个马夫。
• George was already being groomed for the top job.为承担这份高级工作，乔治已在接受专门的培训。

17 acclaim   

v.向…欢呼，公认；n.欢呼，喝彩，称赞

参考例句：

• He was welcomed with great acclaim.他受到十分热烈的欢迎。
• His achievements earned him the acclaim of the scientific community.他的成就赢得了科学界的赞誉。

18 reverence   

n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬

参考例句：

• He was a bishop who was held in reverence by all.他是一位被大家都尊敬的主教。
• We reverence tradition but will not be fettered by it.我们尊重传统，但不被传统所束缚。

19 transcend   

vt.超出，超越(理性等)的范围

参考例句：

• We can't transcend the limitations of the ego.我们无法超越自我的局限性。
• Everyone knows that the speed of airplanes transcend that of ships.人人都知道飞机的速度快于轮船的速度。