To
Giles Gordon
and in memory of
Glenn Gould
Georges Perec
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
I In which Pickleherring takes his pen to tell of his first meeting with Mr Shakespeare
II In which Pickleherring makes strides in a pair of lugged boots
III Pickleherring's Acknowledgements
IV About John Shakespeare and the miller's daughter
V How to spell Shakespeare and what a whittawer is
VI About the begetting of William Shakespeare
VII All the facts about Mr Shakespeare
VIII Which is mostly about choughs but has no choughs in it
IX About the birth of Mr WS
X What if Bretchgirdle was Shakespeare's father?
XI About this book
XII Of WS: his first word, & the otters
XIII Was John Shakespeare John Falstaff?
XIV How Shakespeare's mother played with him
XV What this book is doing
XVI Shakespeare breeches
XVII Pickleherring's room (in which he is writing this book)
XVIII The Man in the Moon, or Pickleherring in praise of country history
XIX Positively the last word about whittawers
XX What if Queen Elizabeth was Shakespeare's mother?
XXI The Shakespeare Arms
XXII Pickleherring's Song
XXIII About the childhood ailments of William Shakespeare
XXIV About the great plague that was late in London
XXV Bretchgirdle's cat
XXVI Of the games of William Shakespeare when he was young
XXVII The midwife Gertrude's tale
XXVIII Of little WS and the cauldron of inspiration & science
XXIX Some tales that William Shakespeare told his mother
XXX What Shakespeare learnt at Stratford Grammar School
XXXI About Pompey Bum + Pickleherring's Shakespeare Test
XXXII Did Shakespeare go to school at Polesworth?
XXXIII Why John Shakespeare liked to be called Jack
XXXIV What Shakespeare saw when he looked under Clopton Bridge
XXXV About water
XXXVI Of weeds and the original Ophelia
XXXVII The revels at Kenilworth 9th July, 1575
XXXVIII More about Jenkins
XXXIX John Shakespeare when sober
XL Jack Naps of Greece: his story
XLI Jack Naps of Greece: his story concluded
XLII Flute
XLIII The speech that Shakespeare made when he killed a calf
XLIV In which there is a death, and a birth, and an earthquake
XLV Pickleherring's peep-hole
XLVI About silk stockings
XLVII How Shakespeare went to teach in Lancashire
XLVIII How Shakespeare went to sea with Francis Drake
XLIX How Shakespeare went to work in a lawyer's office
L How Shakespeare went to the wars & sailed the seas (again?) & took a long walk in the Forest of Arden & captured a castle
LI Pickleherring's confession
LII In which Anne Hathaway
LIII Shakespeare's other Anne
LIV Pickleherring's nine muses
LV In which John Shakespeare plays Shylock
LVI In which Lucy is lousy
LVII Shakespeare's Canopy, or Pickleherring in dispraise of wine
LVIII Pickleherring's Poetics (some more about this book)
LIX What Shakespeare did when first he came to London
LX In which Pickleherring eats an egg in honour of Mr Shakespeare
LXI In which Pickleherring speculates concerning the meaning of eggs
LXII About Mr Richard Field: another ruminating gentleman
LXIII About a great reckoning in a little room
LXIV More
LXV A look at William Shakespeare
LXVI Pickleherring's list of the world's lost plays
LXVII Love's Labour's Won
LXVIII Was Shakespeare raped?
LXLX All about Rizley
LXX A Private Observation
LXXI In which Pickleherring presents a lost sonnet by William Shakespeare
LXXII Who was Shakespeare's Friend?
LXXIII The Dark Lady of the Sonnets 1
LXXIV The Dark Lady of the Sonnets 2
LXXV The Dark Lady of the Sonnets 3
LXXVI The Dark Lady of the Sonnets 4
LXXVII The Dark Lady of the Sonnets 5
LXXVIII Of eggs and Richard Burbage
LXXIX A few more facts and fictions about William Shakespeare
LXXX In which boys will be girls
LXXXI In which Mr Shakespeare is mocked by his fellows
LXXXII Pickleherring's poem
LXXXIII In which Mr Shakespeare plays a game at tennis
LXXXIV What Shakespeare got from Florio + a word about George Peele
LXXXV Deaths, etc.
LXXXVI 'Mrs Lines and Mr Barkworth'
LXXXVII Shakespeare in Scotland & other witchcrafts
LXXXVIII About Comfort Ballantine
LXXXIX In which Pickleherring plays Cleopatra at the house in St John Street
XC Tom o' Bedlam's Song
XCI In which William Shakespeare returns to Stratford
XCII Bottoms
XCIII Some sayings of William Shakespeare
XCIV A word about John Spencer Stockfish
XCV Pickleherring's list of things despaired of
XCVI Shakespeare's Will (with notes by Pickleherring)
XCVII Fire
XCVIII The day Shakespeare died (with his last words, etc.)
XCIX About the funeral of William Shakespeare & certain events thereafter
C In which Pickleherring lays down his pen after telling of the curse on Shakespeare's grave
Postscript
About the Author
By Robert Nye
Copyright
Our pleasant Willy, ah! is dead of late
Edmund Spenser
The Tears of the Muses
A never writer to an ever reader: News.
Chapter One In which Pickleherring takes his pen to tell of his first meeting with Mr Shakespeare
For instance, William Shakespeare. Tell you all about him. All there is that's fit to know about Shakespeare. Mr William Shakespeare. All there is that's not fit, too, for that matter. Who he was and why. Where he was and when. What he was and wherefore. And then, besides, to answer several difficult questions that might be bothering you. Such as, who was the Dark Lady of the sonnets? Such as, why did he leave his wife only his second-best bed? Such as, is it true he died a Papist, and lived a sodomite? Such as, how come he placed that curse on his own grave? All this, and more, you will find answered here. But better begin at the beginning, while we can.
Who am I? Reader, I will tell you suddenly. My name is Robert Reynolds alias Pickleherring and my game is that of a comedian and believe me I was well-acquainted with our famous Mr Shakespeare when I was young. I acted in his plays. I knew his ways. I played Puck to his Oberon. To his Prosper, I was Ariel. I washed my hands sleep-walking too, as the Scottish queen. Why, once, at Blackfriars, the man was sick in my cap. I loved the lovely villain, ladies and gentlemen.
By the time I have finished I think you will have to admit it. There is no man or woman alive in the world who knows more than old Pickleherring about the late Mr Shakespeare.
I call to mind as if it was just yesterday, for instance, the first time I ever clapped eyes on the dear fellow. He was wearing a copataine hat. You won't know those hats now, if you're under fifty. They were good hats. They wore good hats and they wrote good verse in those days. Your copataine hat was a high-crowned job in the shape of a sugar-loaf. Some say the word should be COPOTINK and that it comes from the Dutch. I call a copataine hat a copataine hat. So did Mr Shakespeare, let me tell you. I never heard him say that his hat came from Holland. And in his tragical history of Antony and Cleopatra he has the word COPATAINE. Which part, friends, he wrote first for your servant: Cleopatra. I never wore a copataine hat myself, but then I was only a boy at the time we are speaking of.