Roland Emmerich’s new film, Anonymous, tries very hard to persuade us that Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, was the actual author of the works attributed to William Shakespeare. However, there are too many facts that make the Oxfordian thesis quite untenable. While I agree with Emmerich that Shakespeare did not write the plays and poems he is supposed to have written, we disagree on the identity of the person who did write the works we all admire. I believe they were written by Christopher Marlowe, the great poet-playwright who preceded Shakespeare. I wrote a book on the subject, The Marlowe-Shakespeare Connection.

Marlowe wrote such famous plays as Tamburlaine I & II, Dr. Faustus, The Jew of Malta, Dido Queen of Carthage, The Massacre at Paris, and Edward II. He was considered England’s most successful dramatist until his untimely death in 1593, at the age of 29. But I believe that Marlowe did not die in 1593 as reported. He was the subject of a faked death to save him from execution for blasphemy and atheism. Since Marlowe was also a member of the Secret Service, he had the protection of Lord Burghley, his boss and Queen Elizabeth’s right-hand man. Burghley considered Marlowe to be a very valuable asset and authorized the plan to save him. Marlowe was then sent into exile where he continued to write plays.

The most serious problem with the Earl of Oxford are the dates. Indeed, Diana Price, commenting on the Oxfordian theory in her book, Shakespeare’s Unorthodox Biography, wrote:

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Sam Blumenfeld (photo)