Vern:

> Do you agree with Twain's views on Shakespeare?  Or do you think the
> main
> value of his essay on Shakespeare was his tale about his arguments
> with the
> steamboat pilot?

> Vern you missed the boat on this one!
> I agree with Twain's views on Shakespeare found in  his last book, "Is
> Shakespeare Dead?"Twain along with many more astute writers have
> seen  thru  the Stratford illusion to voice their opinion. It's more
> of a common sense  choice  rather than an ingrained sentimental choice
> to realise as Twain did that  Shakespeare did not have the
> circumstances of a celebrated writer even in his  home town of
> Stratford. It took over a 100 years for him to gain a popularity in
> Stratford, thanks in part to an outsider and entrepenuer named David
> Garrick.  Twain used his own celebrityhood as an example of how he was
> fully acknowledged while he was ALIVE  in  Hannibal.  Is Shakespeare
> Dead? is  Mark Twain  writing as a journalist  with a keen eye and not
> afraid to shake his spear at a few "Tragolydites"  including his
> steamboat pilot Ealer. Clemens was  Twain  as Bacon was Shakespeare.

Twain's passion for  Francis Bacon as author of Shakespeare can  be
viewed  in  a letter he dictatedin 1909. See
http://www.sirbacon.org/links/marktwainletter.html  And for Vern, visit
http://www.sirbacon.org  to get on course.Cheers,Lawrence Gerald

>