SHEAKESPEARE'S FRIEND

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 32, 9 February 1929, Page 15

SHEAKESPEARE'S FRIEND

Of -writing about Shakespeare there 5s no end. Perhaps a larger part of it has been about his sonnets than about any .other equal portion of the outpourings, of his fascinating pen.

Tho first edition of the. Sonnets, published in 10011, for T.T., was dedicated to "Mr. W..11.," and T. T.,'wlioso initials were placed under the dedication, declared that Mr. \V. 11. wns "the onlie Leguttcr of thefc ensuing Souuets.

Who .was W.H.?. And what is meant by W.H. being "tho only begetter" of a. work by "our ever-living poet," Wil.liam Shakespeare? X 6 problem raised by the Sonnets has been more discussed than these. The obvious suggestion is that somehow this unknown W.H. hud a hand in causing tho publication of tho Sonnets.

Some liavo held that W.H. was the jnspircr of tho Sonnets inasmuch as friendship for him caused the poet to lsegiu to ■write■ tliom. Others ' have thought; that W.H. was someone who ■was able to hand the Sonnets over to T.T., tvhose nnuic was Thomas Thorpe, and so secured their publication. Much •writing about this dedication has left it in a hazy mist with no decided answer to the questions raised.

Now wo. hoar .from America, that a well-known book collector, Mr. Dring, has an old book in his possession which, lio claims,' throws a new light oii Mr. AV.H. Indeed, it discloses who he was, and suggests how Shakespeare was brought into touch with him, If tlif book is genuine its interest is very great.. . . If tho book is genuine! That doubt, 'of course, confronts us at. once, for the making of bogus books pretending to be old is yory profitable Strict inquiry wii!have- to bo made us to. the true origin of this book ; which, should it be proved to be genuine, lias a very high .value. Hero, then, is the story. In 1607 Shakespeare's travelling company of actors was playing at Saffron WaSden, in Essex. Tho principal inn ■Micro was the Eose and Crown, kept by a/Mr.,Holgate ) who had a seven-teen-year-old son, AVilliani Holgato (AV.H.), niuch interested in poets and poetry and trying to bo a poet himself. Tho newlydiscovored book is said to be a manuscript commonplace book kept by this young man. It contains one- of Shakespeare's Sonnets and other entries relating .to

Shakespeare. One is the well-known elegy on Shakespeare by William Bass, and another is a poetic epistle to '.'Mr. B. J.," signed F. 8., supposed to be by Francis Beaumont to Ben Jon-

son, and containing a complimentary reference to Shakespeare. On this foundation is built up the theory that Shakespeare was with his company at Saffron AValdon in 1607, became acquainted with young William Holgate, wrote sonnets about him, and gavd him other sonnets, and that William llolgatci made copies of them and supplied them to Thomas Thorpe for publication in 1009. ■ It will be interesting to se vc how Mr. Dring deals with the fact that in 1598, nine years before Shakespeare's com-

puny was at Saffron Waldcn, Francis

Meres published a list of six of Shakespoakor's comedies, six of his tragedies, mentioned bis Venus and Adonis and ■ Luercee, and his '''Sugared Sonnets zirnong his private friends." The sup-

position that Shakespeare's Sonnets about some- youug friend were written about this innkeeper's son ten years after Shakespeare- had settled in prosperity at Stratford carries the son-net-writing period clear out of the time when, be was writing in> such a; style. And, besides, the Sonnets about his young friend tell clearly of the passage of three years, which, dating from 1607; would be a full year beyond the time •when the Sonnets had been pirated and published as we now have them. The Saffron Walden commonplace book)' based on tho letters \V. 11., is just the kind of production that might be expected to appear on tho market for boole collectors. - \