The argument that Francis Bacon, not Shakespeare, wrote the plays
Edwin Reed’s 1902 first edition makes the case, a position from the historical authorship controversy rather than modern consensus.
The story
Edwin Reed believed that the plays and poems known as Shakespeare’s were really written by Francis Bacon, and this book is his case for it. It belongs to the long-running argument over who wrote Shakespeare, and it takes a side that modern scholarship does not share.
Charles E. Goodspeed published it in Boston in 1902, and John Wilson and Son printed it at the University Press. Reed dedicated it to Jonathan Denny. A reader now gets the Baconian argument as one of its committed advocates put it.
This copy is the first edition, in the publisher’s original gray paper-covered boards with a cream cloth spine and a printed paper label, now faded. The boards and spine are soiled, the corners bumped and rubbed, the spine ends frayed; the text block is untrimmed, with mostly clean pages and light spotting. A leaf before the title presents the book to Willard Howland “with compliments of the author”; the handwriting has not been authenticated.
Details
- Date
- 1902
- Publisher
- Charles E. Goodspeed, Boston
- Edition
- First edition, 1902 Boston imprint
- Binding
- cloth: Cream cloth spine over gray paper-covered boards; printed paper spine title label; publisher's quarter cloth
- Condition
- Original gray paper-covered boards and cream cloth spine, printed paper title label with fading, soiling to boards and spine, bumped and rubbed corners, fraying at head/tail of spine and worn joint edges; deckled/untrimmed text block with mostly clean photographed pages and light scattered spotting; hinge strength and entire pagination not checked; no jacket in photos.
- Presentation note
- Willard Howland Esq., with compliments of the author.