> Virginia Woolf wrote a famous essay, 'Shakespeare's sister', about how a figure like her could never hope to be a writer or have her writing preserved, so she has become something of a symbol for all the lost voices of early modern women.

This is a central point also that Woolf makes in _A Room of One's Own_.

...which according to my wife is an awesome book (she is reading it right now).

There's a funny moment where she goes (paraphrasing), if you're a man stop reading right now, this part is not for you, ladies only.

The reigning monarch during much of shakespeare and his sister's life was queen elizabeth - a woman.

And the most famous line from her most famous speech is… ?

The most famous line from Henry the VIII's speech is?

They didn't give speeches back then because they didn't give a fuck about the public.

“I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too”

https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/queen-elizabeth-speech-...

Between Elizabeth I, Catherine Di Medici, Roxalana of Turkey, and Mary Queen of Scots, female rulers were unusually common.

Female writers were unusually rare.

Yes, and of course all of the rights and social privileges which applied to the monarchy applied likewise to everyone else, and thus all women during the Elizabethan era were precisely as free as Elizabeth herself.

My apologies. I keep keep forgetting people here are incapable of detecting sarcasm.

Your perspective is skewed. Virginia Woolf lived in the 20th century, and the Elizabethan period ended a few centuries before she was born. You can't use Virginia Woolf to prove anything about gender norms in the Elizabethan period, much less compare the norms between royal, noble and common women during Shakespeare's time.

Just putting things into perspective, here.

The quote you give, is a nice example to see how history, historical research, etc has everything to do with setting the scene for the present, and not much to do with the past.

History is a present day activity. It is akin to the background scenery in a play - it provides the context for the present, it sets up our current stories. It's all to do with interpretation, and that is only ever present.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespears_Sister on the money here.

> on the money here.

Or, maybe not, according to the article. But "Stay" is still an amazing piece of art.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCYaALgW80c

I was 10 when stay came out but I can still remember the music video clear as day. Only other one from that time I remember that clearly was earth song.

Siobhan Fahey's performance is otherworldly! We named our daughter after her (and a bit after Siobhán Donaghy).

IIRC from an interview with her, the otherworldly performance is something to do with the bottle of vodka she drank while waiting for everyone else to get ready

I know that story. :)

Apparently the band was named after the song by the Smiths, which in turn was named after the essay by Virginia Woolf.

See also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare_Was_a_Woman_and_Ot...

What is the relevance?

Like all alternative authorship theories, this one is based on a fundamental misunderstanding, that being that "great art" is necessarily biographical or reflects the "soul" of the artist. Once you've made that error, you can trivially point out that Shakespeare wrote about people, places, and situations that the Stratford man wouldn't have been personally familiar with, and then you can pick anyone else you like from the era that you think might match your profile better. This exact process has been used for Bacon, Derby, Oxford, and dozens of other claimants; nobody has offered a truly new argument against Shakespeare for decades.

I recommend the book _Contested Will: Who Wrote Shakespeare?_ by James S. Shapiro as the definitive work examining, explaining, and debunking alternative authorship theories. It's thoughtful and well-written, not the dry diatribe one might expect.

At first I thought you were referring to _Who wrote Shakespeare?_ by John Michell, which I would recommend. They sound like very similar books.

If anyone has read both recently, what are the main differences between them?

> Shakespeare's sister: Digital archives reveal insights into unknown sibling

The title is misleading. All 7 of shakespeare's siblings are documented and known. What was unknown was the religious faith of shakespeare's younger sister Joan. The article is about how libraries opening up digital archives makes life easier for researchers.

But this being 2024, of course, political gibberish has to be injected into everything.

> There are hundreds of thousands of words surviving from her brother, and until now none at all, of any description, from her.

Because her brother was Willaim Fucking Shakespeare. Shakespeare had 3 brothers - Gilbert, Richard and Edmund. How much of their words does the writer of the article know? Is the author really whining that we have much more surviving words from one of the greatest writers of the english language than from his sister?

The amount of idiocy from universities is remarkable. I'm all for discussing the problems of sexism that women and men of that era faced. But I've had enough of the bizarre and illogical arguments put forth by worthless politcal hacks. What's next? University of Bristols is going to cry about how we have more footage of lebron james dunking in the NBA than from his brother? Are they going to cry about how we have more movies from ron howard than from his less talented brother?

It's an article about how digital archived allowed researchers to discover that the 'J shakespeare' who pledged their allegiance to the pope was Joan Shakespeare ( sister ) not John Shakespeare ( father ). Heck, if it wasn't for william shakespeare, nobbody would have even cared.

Also, shakespeare isn't even the most documented person of his own era. It was Queen Elizabeth. Maybe the geniuses at the university might have heard of her. So sick of this nonsense. And what's worse is that the nonsense isn't even in good faith.

I didn’t notice any gender politics in the article at all. You may be the one injecting that “nonsense” in this case.

Thou art a knave, a rascal, and a fool,

Whose wit is dull, whose words are but a tool

To spread thy ignorance and petty spite,

And cast aspersions on a lady's plight.

Thou speakest of the Bard with reverence due,

Yet fail to see the point, which should be true:

That women of that time were oft denied

The chance to let their talents be espied.

Thou makest false comparisons, weak and vain,

Of siblings who in diff'rent spheres did reign.

'Tis not of footage or of dunks we speak,

But of the chances lost, the voices meek.

Thy words betray a mind that's closed and small,

That cannot see beyond its narrow wall.

Thou rail'st against the learned and the wise,

Yet 'tis thy own defects that meet our eyes.

So hold thy tongue, thou churlish, clownish knave,

And let the truth, once hidden, now be grave.

For Joan, though overshadowed by her kin,

Deserves to have her story writ therein.

Nice ChatGPT

So they found this document, two people saw it, they made a digital copy, and then the original was lost? That seems to be what the linked article is saying, and I can't access the paper.

That seems sketchy as hell.

Stay!