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Grant Shillings's avatar

It’s funny; I got embroiled in an argument on Twitter when I once made an offhand comment about It being “pretty well accepted nowadays that Shakespeare was not one person.” People were furious. Randos from distant corners of the internet got involved and personally attacked me as if it were my fault. To this day it is still (sadly) my tweet with the most engagement.

But I come at it from a different angle. I found out about the theory that Shakespeare was not one person from a highly secretive easter egg in a video game about solving mysteries (The Witness). Maybe it was the setting of the game, but this revelation was exciting, intoxicating, almost taboo. It felt like I had come across a hidden CIA file. And I thought it was plausible, probably more plausible than the idea that an uneducated farmer or regular playwright could do what “Shakespeare” did.

This theory didn’t take away any of the magic of Shakespeare for me, but if anything, enhanced it. I imagined a secret society of bright minds working collaboratively to come up with these great plays. In some ways, this is harder than a solo project. I can barely get my friends to agree on where we should get dinner.

I have no problem with there being Geniuses in the world. In fact, there is no shortage of them to constantly remind me how inadequate I am. My own heroes- Thoreau, Wallace, de Botton, etc. are so impressive that I will never approach their lofty heights no matter how well or how long I write. And that’s ok.

But this alternative theory of Shakespeare suggests something else promising— that through collaboration I could be part of something greater than myself, something perhaps even legendary. And that keeps me going.

You know what’s really genius? Substack. No matter who is the best writer on here, the fact that we all get to come on and share our writing and discuss and collaborate— to me that’s truly magical.

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Riley Van Cleve's avatar

Wow wow wow wow

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