The Facts About Shakespeare | Page 7

that about this time the boy was withdrawn from school to help in his
father's business. We know nothing certainly, however, until we learn
from the registry of the Bishop of Worcester that on November 28,
1582, two husbandmen of Stratford gave bonds "to defend and save
harmless" the bishop and his officers for licensing the marriage of
William Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway. Of the actual marriage there
is no record. Anne is probably to be identified with Agnes or Anne, the
daughter of Richard Hathaway of the neighboring hamlet of Shottery,
who had died in the previous July, and had owned the house of which a
part still survives and is shown to visitors as "Anne Hathaway's
cottage." The date on Anne's tombstone indicates that she was eight
years older than the poet.
A comparison of the bond just mentioned with other documents of the
kind indicates it to be exceptional in the absence of any mention of
consent by the bridegroom's parents, a circumstance rendered still more
remarkable by the fact that he was a minor. The bondsmen were from
Shottery, and this, along with the considerations already advanced, has
naturally led to the inference that the marriage was hurried by the
bride's friends, and to the finding of a motive for their haste in the birth
within six months of "Susanna, daughter to William Shakespere," who
was baptized on May 26, 1583.
[Page Heading: "The only Shake-scene"]
The record of the baptism of Shakespeare's only other children, the
twins Hamnet and Judith, in February, 1585, practically exhausts the
documentary evidence concerning the poet in Stratford until 1596. It is
conjectured, but not known, that about 1586 he found his way to
London and soon became connected with the theater, according to one
tradition, as call-boy, to another, as holder of the horses of theatergoers.
But by 1592 we are assured that he had entered the ranks of the
playwrights, and had achieved enough success to rouse the jealous
resentment of a rival. Robert Greene, who died on the third of
September in that year, left unpublished a pamphlet, Greenes

Groatsworth of Witte: bought with a Million of Repentaunce, in which
he warned three of his fellows against certain plagiarists, "those puppits,
I meane, that speake from our mouths, those anticks garnisht in our
colours." "Yes, trust them not," he goes on; "for there is an upstart crow,
beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers heart wrapt in a
Players hide, supposes he is as well able to bumbast out a blanke verse
as the best of you; and being an absolute Johannes Factotum, is in his
owne conceit the only Shake-scene in a countrie. O that I might intreate
your rare wits to be imployed in more profitable courses, and let those
apes imitate your past excellence, and never more acquaint them with
your admired inventions! I know the best husband of you all will never
prove an usurer, and the kindest of them all wil never proove a kinde
nurse; yet, whilst you may, seeke you better maisters, for it is pittie
men of such rare wits should be subject to the pleasures of such rude
groomes." The phrase about the "tyger's heart" is an obvious parody on
the line,
Oh Tiger's heart wrapt in a woman's hide!
which occurs both in The True Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, and
in the variant of that play which is included in the First Folio as the
third part of Henry VI. "The only Shake-scene" has naturally been
taken as an allusion to Shakespeare's name; and it is scarcely possible
to doubt the reference to him throughout the passage. This being so, we
may infer that by this date Shakespeare had written, with whatever else,
his share in the three parts of Henry VI, and was successful enough to
seem formidable to the dying Greene. It is noteworthy, too, that thus
early we have allusion to his double profession: as an actor in the
words "player's hide" and "Shake-scene," and as an author in the charge
of plagiarism. That the reference in "beautified with our feathers" is to
literary plagiarism is confirmed by the following lines from Greene's
Funeralls, by R. B., 1594, which seem to have been suggested by
Greene's phrase:
Greene is the ground of everie painters die; Greene gave the ground to
all that wrote upon him. Nay, more, the men that so eclipst his fame,
Purloynde his plumes: can they deny the same?

Somewhat less certain is the allusion in a document closely connected
with the foregoing. Greenes Groatsworth had been prepared for the
press by his friend Henry Chettle, and in the address "To the
Gentlemen Readers" prefixed to his Kind-Harts Dreame (registered
December 8, 1592), Chettle regrets that he has not struck