Did Shakespeare Write It?

[oggbashan]

The odds of the noble peasant accomplishing shit are miniscule.

Peasant? Shakespeare and his father were far above peasantry. His father was one of the most prominent citizens of Stratford, admittedly a small country town at the time, but a businessman, a tradesman, a landowner and was elected to a major office at their equivalent of City Hall.

Shakespeare's father was one of the local establishment big wigs, below the nobility certainly, but near the top of Stratford's elite.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Peasant? Shakespeare and his father were far above peasantry. His father was one of the most prominent citizens of Stratford, admittedly a small country town at the time, but a businessman, a tradesman, a landowner and was elected to a major office at their equivalent of City Hall.

Shakespeare's father was one of the local establishment big wigs, below the nobility certainly, but near the top of Stratford's elite.

I grew up in such a town. The pinnacle of our society strutted like a peacock because his grandfather was a lieutenant in my ancestors brigade. His parents were a vicar and a florist.

Some characterize Shakespeare as a play merchant, more producer than creator.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

I did say most scholars, and not 'most academics.'

Scholar meaning a learned person, one who learns.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I did say most scholars, and not 'most academics.'

Scholar meaning a learned person, one who learns.

Shakespeare the man reminds me of Alfred Hitchcock NOT a writer. Wm had collaborators, its known. Titian did, too. So was he an impresario?

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Shakespeare didn't write any of it. It was written by a schizophrenic Italo-Danish earl who was fifth or sixth in line of succession to the throne of Schleswig-Holstein. Voices had told him he must write brilliant (and a few not-so-brilliant) plays in English, but he also knew that in following so base a career as the theatre offered, he would be denied his birthright. And so it came to pass that he engaged the services of a mayor's son as his public facade, a young man who spent his life pretending to have written works he was entirely incapable of writing.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Shakespeare didn't write any of it. It was written by a schizophrenic Italo-Danish earl who was fifth or sixth in line of succession to the throne of Schleswig-Holstein. Voices had told him he must write brilliant (and a few not-so-brilliant) plays in English, but he also knew that in following so base a career as the theatre offered, he would be denied his birthright. And so it came to pass that he engaged the services of a mayor's son as his public facade, a young man who spent his life pretending to have written works he was entirely incapable of writing.

Youre wandering into my line of work. Shakespeare is a poor fit with his credits.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Youre wandering into my line of work. Shakespeare is a poor fit with his credits.

This is the first time you've really confused me, James.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

This is the first time you've really confused me, James.

Shakespeare's life is congruent with an impresario NOT a creator. He was more John Ringling than Ernest Hemingway.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Shakespeare's life is congruent with an impresario NOT a creator. He was more John Ringling than Ernest Hemingway.

OK, we'll skip my confusion, but...

wasn't Chaucer's life congruent with that of a customs collector?

and TSE's congruent with that of an editor?

Just saying...

 

[TamLin01]

Poor people can't write. Real talent happens only to people from Respected Families, preferably with High Blood and Good Expectations.

Filthy commoners have never, ever created anything with artistic merit. This is a sound academic argument.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

I actually think we're gettin' somewhere here - in spite of TL01's petty jibes (hehehe... Waiting for a barb now.)

If you look at really good movies as an example, a lot of them benefit from the original creators having sensational directors working on the final product. Not only that, a screenplay is different to the original story text and sometimes requires a different type of writer to do it well.

Even production managers who make physical things will tell you that they often rely on really good specialist subcontractors - Ferruccio Lamborghini made great sports cars, but he didn't actually 'pen' them as such.

Why isn't it possible for the actual William Shakespeare (the actual person of that name) to have been some kind of relied upon subcontractor who specialised in the stage craft action and even some of the actors stage delivery ideas but not necessarily the inner textual workings and the themes and fundamental stories, many of which were not well known by anyone outside of a very clicque-y Euro-aristocracy? WS need not have been 'just a front.' By in my view, neither could he have been the actual originator nor author of certain of the plays and sonnets.

...There are certain things that 'even' academics are simply unaware of when it comes to matters of the aristocracy; a secret code or language, if you will, which identifies one to the other. It is not possible for William Shakespeare the person, to have been the original writer.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Poor people can't write. Real talent happens only to people from Respected Families, preferably with High Blood and Good Expectations.

Filthy commoners have never, ever created anything with artistic merit. This is a sound academic argument.

The smart money bets on it.

 

[lovecraft68]

Poor people can't write. Real talent happens only to people from Respected Families, preferably with High Blood and Good Expectations.

Filthy commoners have never, ever created anything with artistic merit. This is a sound academic argument.

Of course it is because the wealthy respected families tell us it is and they are the most honest forthright people in the world.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Of course it is because the wealthy respected families tell us it is and they are the most honest forthright people in the world.

How many poor prodigies can you name from the late 16th Century? Besides none.

 

[lovecraft68]

How many poor prodigies can you name from the late 16th Century? Besides none.

How many bought/stole their wares from the poor and passed them off as their own? No copyright back then and they could easily have the poor soul killed. I wouldn't be surprised if more than half of the so called greats back then were petty thieves.

The wealthy have always been thieves more so today than ever. The difference is with the advent of the net and common laws the poor also have a chance.

Birthright does not ensure intelligence especially when many families were inbreeding.

We need to consult Pilot. Not only is he from a very wealthy family(as I a sure his wife is as well of course) but I heard he is an expert on 16th century everything, like he is everything else.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

How many bought/stole their wares from the poor and passed them off as their own? No copyright back then and they could easily have the poor soul killed. I wouldn't be surprised if more than half of the so called greats back then were petty thieves.

The wealthy have always been thieves more so today than ever. The difference is with the advent of the net and common laws the poor also have a chance.

Birthright does not ensure intelligence especially when many families were inbreeding.

We need to consult Pilot. Not only is he from a very wealthy family(as I a sure his wife is as well of course) but I heard he is an expert on 16th century everything, like he is everything else.

I suspect PILOT is Shakespeare, he's the right age.

 

[TamLin01]

Why isn't it possible for the actual William Shakespeare (the actual person of that name) to have been some kind of relied upon subcontractor who specialised in the stage craft action and even some of the actors stage delivery ideas but not necessarily the inner textual workings and the themes and fundamental stories, many of which were not well known by anyone outside of a very clicque-y Euro-aristocracy?

Being possible doesn't make it so. Evidence does. So far, no evidence has been offered here. Just speculation and prejudice.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Really, there is masses of evidence nowdays about this. I'm not really sure where you are getting that few 'academics' agree it was probably De Vere. The latest published academic papers all indicate De Vere.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

I think one of the most basic problems with this question is that all the arguments 'pro-Stratfordian contra anyone else,' have this issue they are heavily exercised by, about 'upper class snobbery' merely asserting a peasant 'could not have...'

And then this becomes the main focus as if to say 'see there IS snobbery here and therefore the whole case is THUS dismissed.'

But snobbery alone is not in fact the basis of the contra-Stratfordian case. And too much of the repititious pro-Stratfordian arguments labour ONLY the mere existence of snobbery, though they never deal with what the snobs say they are seeing. And this is as if to say, that WHATEVER they say they are seeing simply MUST be either a lie, or a deception, or an illusion.

And then the other problem with the Oxfordian case which cannot be properly dealt with by people who want to be seen as conservative supporters of the status quo, is that Shakespeare consistently pretty much outright says that 'some' royal houses (meaning the English one, of course! And many other European ones too) have incestuous, gay and lesbian, bisexual and bastard and other and even entirely not-related members within them who end up ruling for diverse reasons and some even, have more closeness to heathen witchery than Roman Popes - even while they also have high ranking churchmen with illegitimate offspring amongst them!!!

The fact that many of his plays contain roles in which a male or a boy plays a woman or a girl - or the reverse - and often too, a male playing a female playing a male and vice versa... this all has nothing to do with a lack of female actors (which is sometimes ascribed as the cause) or a fashion of the day for the stage dramas.

It has to do with what it has to do with!

And more obviously so because of the choices of the names and places actually used. Names such as Orsino or the King of Bohemia or the Duke of Sicily and also other factors that critics refer to as 'scansion' (but are not really that at all) such as the use of historical characters at historically incorrect times (Pericles, Polixenes).

There really WAS an Orsini Duke of Bohemia or Count of Sicily and he would have been a relative of Catherine de Medici. What is he doing in a Shakespeare play implying that he is either a lover of a regent or a protected, covert relative?

I mean but that is simply the thin end of the wedge - the stuff goes on and on: lesbian lovers, cross-dressers at court, a huge list of items. 'Abandoned' sons and daughters dedicated to the (literal, in the text, who actually 'appears' in the play) Goddess Diana, has special meaning too.

Yes there is what you could easily say is snobbery, but it is within the plays themselves!!

The (snob) implication of many of the plays is that rulers rule by divine right of paganistic and classical GODS, not by the church, essentially, although the church, if and when used by these rulers, comes into its own and best use (as implied by the plays).

Pro-Stratfordians push aside the case that the actual William Shakespeare was virtually illiterate; and this kind of dismissing of clearcut evidence is similar to what muslims do when someone presses them on whether anything or which actual bit of the Koran was actually written down at the time of Mohammed.

There are also a large number of internal references within the plays to European aristocracy ideas about who should rule England - none of which would be accepted by much of the ecclesiastical establishment then or now, although the case for Queen Elizabeth because of these same arguments (acceptance of bastardry rulers, female rulers, even female KINGS, rather than 'Queens,' as well as the potential that Elizabeth was a Medici in any case) is strongly made time and time again in the plays.

The notion that a standard though 'good' education open to all middle classes meant that a certain knowledge of Latin and Greek would be known demonstrates ignorance what what kinds of Latin and Greek occur within Shakesperean plays; high Classical Greek and a knowledge of the most exclusive Oxfordian books of the actual whole 'Platonic Schools' appears, and not just a smitter-smattering of any old words and names. 'Polixenes' is a very special Greek word. It is not by any means something, in context, you would have had access to from a Greek tutor, rather, you would have had it from a Doctor of the Laws from Padua (meaning, a 'medici' with all of the occult learning of the Serrenissima and its ideological equivalent in Florence). This is really, one of the most amazing appearances in a Shakespeare play - the fact the the author equates a 'Doctor of THE Laws' with Venice, is like saying the Medici (sort of as would the Mafia) run England. Because in fact he has the judge in the play accept the SCHOLAR as the highest legal authority!! That is what the implication would be to an English aristocrat who otherwise would hold that he had English LAW and English Justice. And then, to cap it off, Shakespeare even makes this lawyer a female dressed as a young male lawyer from Padua. And that would straight out tell you that he means to say that the Serrenissima itself had sent one of its own magistrate agents (which it was in the habit of doing, most of whom were females) on a particular mission.

Well if you wanted to draw a very long bow and say that William Shakespeare ACCIDENTALLY had all these things happen just as a consequence of the run of the story, you could, but...

And there is another thing, something up to the minute. The implication that Shakespeare intends for a strange, typically Venetian, loose-living, loose-moralled (by C of E standards) occult-directed, non-patronimical rulership to obtain, also has implications about just what actually happened when Napoleon entered Venice - and also explains (as an after effect in history of what was going on even at the time of Elizabeth) a lot of what happened after Wellington and why the establishment dealt with him the way they did. It implies many other things but I cannot say. Or perhaps not here in this subject.

William Leahy of Brunel University and Sir Derek Jacobi are Oxfordians and they of course they are completely correct and their arguments much deeper than any silly nonsense that 'just' snobbery drives the anti-Stratfordians.

Shakespeare consistently uses themes like the royal symbol of the bear - Ursus, Orsino - and the defunct kingdom of Bohemia, and children who disappear in small boats only to turn up later in some royal court with special treatment, he writes of Caesar (same basic symbology) and patronage of Venus and Diana, the possible offspring of Cleopatra, he even actually talks about Arcadia and mentions it clearly and what it means. And all of this stuff is from a belief in the British Royals that they are somehow related to Caesar, to Cleopatra, to the Medici, and even to various gods as well. I'm not sure why some parochial writer would desire to actually continuously and continuously and continuously push these virtual political and aristocracy propaganda ideas, and pepper his writings with all kinds of specialised names and symbols and court technicalities pertaining to a Venetian royal house when he was living in a small farmlet in Tudor England. Venetian secrets were secrets on pain of death. Venetians were also extraordinarily wealthy and often kept personal wealth in secret boxes of a certain name - which Shakespeare uses in his plays.

It's easy to say from a distance today, oh well, these names and places and things are not secrets now.

Well, they're not TO YOU.

The knowledge that the Venetians sent out good-looking, clever, highly intelligent women as agents whose mission was to marry into some foreign ruling house, was a secret then.

 

[DesEsseintes]

I think one of the most basic problems with this question is that all the arguments 'pro-Stratfordian contra anyone else,' have this issue they are heavily exercised by, about 'upper class snobbery' merely asserting a peasant 'could not have...'

And then this becomes the main focus as if to say 'see there IS snobbery here and therefore the whole case is THUS dismissed.'

But snobbery alone is not in fact the basis of the contra-Stratfordian case. And too much of the repititious pro-Stratfordian arguments labour ONLY the mere existence of snobbery, though they never deal with what the snobs say they are seeing. And this is as if to say, that WHATEVER they say they are seeing simply MUST be either a lie, or a deception, or an illusion.

And then the other problem with the Oxfordian case which cannot be properly dealt with by people who want to be seen as conservative supporters of the status quo, is that Shakespeare consistently pretty much outright says that 'some' royal houses (meaning the English one, of course! And many other European ones too) have incestuous, gay and lesbian, bisexual and bastard and other and even entirely not-related members within them who end up ruling for diverse reasons and some even, have more closeness to heathen witchery than Roman Popes - even while they also have high ranking churchmen with illegitimate offspring amongst them!!!

The fact that many of his plays contain roles in which a male or a boy plays a woman or a girl - or the reverse - and often too, a male playing a female playing a male and vice versa... this all has nothing to do with a lack of female actors (which is sometimes ascribed as the cause) or a fashion of the day for the stage dramas.

It has to do with what it has to do with!

And more obviously so because of the choices of the names and places actually used. Names such as Orsino or the King of Bohemia or the Duke of Sicily and also other factors that critics refer to as 'scansion' (but are not really that at all) such as the use of historical characters at historically incorrect times (Pericles, Polixenes).

There really WAS an Orsini Duke of Bohemia or Count of Sicily and he would have been a relative of Catherine de Medici. What is he doing in a Shakespeare play implying that he is either a lover of a regent or a protected, covert relative?

I mean but that is simply the thin end of the wedge - the stuff goes on and on: lesbian lovers, cross-dressers at court, a huge list of items. 'Abandoned' sons and daughters dedicated to the (literal, in the text, who actually 'appears' in the play) Goddess Diana, has special meaning too.

Yes there is what you could easily say is snobbery, but it is within the plays themselves!!

The (snob) implication of many of the plays is that rulers rule by divine right of paganistic and classical GODS, not by the church, essentially, although the church, if and when used by these rulers, comes into its own and best use (as implied by the plays).

Pro-Stratfordians push aside the case that the actual William Shakespeare was virtually illiterate; and this kind of dismissing of clearcut evidence is similar to what muslims do when someone presses them on whether anything or which actual bit of the Koran was actually written down at the time of Mohammed.

There are also a large number of internal references within the plays to European aristocracy ideas about who should rule England - none of which would be accepted by much of the ecclesiastical establishment then or now, although the case for Queen Elizabeth because of these same arguments (acceptance of bastardry rulers, female rulers, even female KINGS, rather than 'Queens,' as well as the potential that Elizabeth was a Medici in any case) is strongly made time and time again in the plays.

The notion that a standard though 'good' education open to all middle classes meant that a certain knowledge of Latin and Greek would be known demonstrates ignorance what what kinds of Latin and Greek occur within Shakesperean plays; high Classical Greek and a knowledge of the most exclusive Oxfordian books of the actual whole 'Platonic Schools' appears, and not just a smitter-smattering of any old words and names. 'Polixenes' is a very special Greek word. It is not by any means something, in context, you would have had access to from a Greek tutor, rather, you would have had it from a Doctor of the Laws from Padua (meaning, a 'medici' with all of the occult learning of the Serrenissima and its ideological equivalent in Florence). This is really, one of the most amazing appearances in a Shakespeare play - the fact the the author equates a 'Doctor of THE Laws' with Venice, is like saying the Medici (sort of as would the Mafia) run England. Because in fact he has the judge in the play accept the SCHOLAR as the highest legal authority!! That is what the implication would be to an English aristocrat who otherwise would hold that he had English LAW and English Justice. And then, to cap it off, Shakespeare even makes this lawyer a female dressed as a young male lawyer from Padua. And that would straight out tell you that he means to say that the Serrenissima itself had sent one of its own magistrate agents (which it was in the habit of doing, most of whom were females) on a particular mission.

Well if you wanted to draw a very long bow and say that William Shakespeare ACCIDENTALLY had all these things happen just as a consequence of the run of the story, you could, but...

And there is another thing, something up to the minute. The implication that Shakespeare intends for a strange, typically Venetian, loose-living, loose-moralled (by C of E standards) occult-directed, non-patronimical rulership to obtain, also has implications about just what actually happened when Napoleon entered Venice - and also explains (as an after effect in history of what was going on even at the time of Elizabeth) a lot of what happened after Wellington and why the establishment dealt with him the way they did. It implies many other things but I cannot say. Or perhaps not here in this subject.

William Leahy of Brunel University and Sir Derek Jacobi are Oxfordians and they of course they are completely correct and their arguments much deeper than any silly nonsense that 'just' snobbery drives the anti-Stratfordians.

Shakespeare consistently uses themes like the royal symbol of the bear - Ursus, Orsino - and the defunct kingdom of Bohemia, and children who disappear in small boats only to turn up later in some royal court with special treatment, he writes of Caesar (same basic symbology) and patronage of Venus and Diana, the possible offspring of Cleopatra, he even actually talks about Arcadia and mentions it clearly and what it means. And all of this stuff is from a belief in the British Royals that they are somehow related to Caesar, to Cleopatra, to the Medici, and even to various gods as well. I'm not sure why some parochial writer would desire to actually continuously and continuously and continuously push these virtual political and aristocracy propaganda ideas, and pepper his writings with all kinds of specialised names and symbols and court technicalities pertaining to a Venetian royal house when he was living in a small farmlet in Tudor England. Venetian secrets were secrets on pain of death. Venetians were also extraordinarily wealthy and often kept personal wealth in secret boxes of a certain name - which Shakespeare uses in his plays.

It's easy to say from a distance today, oh well, these names and places and things are not secrets now.

Well, they're not TO YOU.

The knowledge that the Venetians sent out good-looking, clever, highly intelligent women as agents whose mission was to marry into some foreign ruling house, was a secret then.

Occam's razor would have saved you a great deal of time.

 

[TamLin01]

How many poor prodigies can you name from the late 16th Century? Besides none.

Christopher Marlowe, son of a shoemaker. And Ben Jonson, whose stepfather pulled him out of school to work as a brickmaker. John Webster was the son of a coach maker, if I recall. All playwrights of the period, you'll notice, which isn't really odd at all, since in those days a man from a good family getting mixed up being a playwright was unseemly. Plays weren't real art, they were popular entertainment so suspect that they had to be performed on the other side of the river, with the whorehouses.

Really, there is masses of evidence nowdays about this. I'm not really sure where you are getting that few 'academics' agree it was probably De Vere.

No, they don't. Only a very small number of academics give the conspiracy any credit. The overwhelming majority say Shakespeare.

I
And then this becomes the main focus as if to say 'see there IS snobbery here and therefore the whole case is THUS dismissed.'

Well in this case it *is* the whole case. JBJ has offered nothing by way of evidence except his continued insistence that, for some reason, these plays had to have been written by someone in the wealthy elite. That's the argument that's been put forth here.

Yes there is what you could easily say is snobbery, but it is within the plays themselves!!

The (snob) implication of many of the plays is that rulers rule by divine right of paganistic and classical GODS, not by the church, essentially, although the church, if and when used by these rulers, comes into its own and best use (as implied by the plays).

Because that was the status quo political thought at the time. But nowhere in Shakespeare's plays does it say that a man of his background couldn't write plays.

Pro-Stratfordians push aside the case that the actual William Shakespeare was virtually illiterate.

They probably dismiss it because it's not true. He would have gone to the free school in Stratford and gotten the same basic education any Alderman's son would have.

The notion that a standard though 'good' education open to all middle classes meant that a certain knowledge of Latin and Greek would be known demonstrates ignorance what what kinds of Latin and Greek occur within Shakesperean plays; high Classical Greek and a knowledge of the most exclusive Oxfordian books of the actual whole 'Platonic Schools' appears, and not just a smitter-smattering of any old words and names.

Again, not really. Shakespeare's plays are, if anything, famous for their many errors. His basic sources (Ovid, Holinshed, etc) would have been readily available. Further, early editors and producers had a bad habit of sticking their own material in where it suited them or where they felt the play "needed it," which accounts for a lot of the wonkiness people read such cryptic nonsense into these days.

I'm not sure why some parochial writer would desire to actually continuously and continuously and continuously push these virtual political and aristocracy propaganda ideas.

Because he was a politically conservative middle class dude who knew what was good for him and had no desire to spend the rest of his life in jail for preaching radical ideas that would never have occurred to someone like him anyway. To say nothing of his desire to get paid.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

GOOD FREND FOR JESUS SAKE FORBEARE TO
DIGG THE DUST ENCLOASED HEARE.
BLEST BE YE MAN YT SPARES THES STONES AND
CURST BE HE YT MOVES MY BONES

This is the epitaph of William Shakespeare.

I have no trouble believing such a man could have at least co-written this work. Was he perhaps assisted by men of refinement and culture, given the equivalent of one of our Volunteer Editors? Maybe. That did not make him any less the playwright than doing so here at Lit makes one of us less of an author.

Case closed, at least for me.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Christopher Marlowe, son of a shoemaker. And Ben Jonson, whose stepfather pulled him out of school to work as a brickmaker. John Webster was the son of a coach maker, if I recall. All playwrights of the period, you'll notice, which isn't really odd at all, since in those days a man from a good family getting mixed up being a playwright was unseemly. Plays weren't real art, they were popular entertainment so suspect that they had to be performed on the other side of the river, with the whorehouses.



No, they don't. Only a very small number of academics give the conspiracy any credit. The overwhelming majority say Shakespeare.



Well in this case it *is* the whole case. JBJ has offered nothing by way of evidence except his continued insistence that, for some reason, these plays had to have been written by someone in the wealthy elite. That's the argument that's been put forth here.



Because that was the status quo political thought at the time. But nowhere in Shakespeare's plays does it say that a man of his background couldn't write plays.



They probably dismiss it because it's not true. He would have gone to the free school in Stratford and gotten the same basic education any Alderman's son would have.



Again, not really. Shakespeare's plays are, if anything, famous for their many errors. His basic sources (Ovid, Holinshed, etc) would have been readily available. Further, early editors and producers had a bad habit of sticking their own material in where it suited them or where they felt the play "needed it," which accounts for a lot of the wonkiness people read such cryptic nonsense into these days.



Because he was a politically conservative middle class dude who knew what was good for him and had no desire to spend the rest of his life in jail for preaching radical ideas that would never have occurred to someone like him anyway. To say nothing of his desire to get paid.

One of my ancestors came along a few years after Shakespeare, his name was Samuel Johnson, Dr. Johnsons uncle. My Samuel Johnson was a radical cleric and bomb throwing writer who hated Roman Catholics. On one occasion he publicly insulted JAMES II and got 330 lashes for it. JAMES was a Roman Catholic. Sam's son, James, had already fled to America. Sam was chaplain to Bertrand Russell's ancestor, I think the mans name was William Russell.

 

[SamScribble]

I had a friend - a writer - who always referred to 'William Shakespeare', with quotation marks. He used to insist that William Shakespeare was a brand - not unlike Nike or Apple. Who knows? He might have been on to something.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

There are secrets within the texts, that are known to high aristocrats, as a means - same as when Sheba visited Solomon - of entering places where you are either not yet known, or do not wish to be openly known.

The negative consequences of alertin ABSOLUTELY EVERYBODY to them, is that people will go about being 'lawyers' and arguing cases at the bar table when they really shouldn't try to.

'A young scholar from Padua' WHO HAS SOMEONE ANNOUNCE, OR OTHERWISE DECLARES HIS TUTORS - IS an academic and a lawyer.

For one example.

And it is a bad idea for me to go through all of them.

But I do note Johnson having just made some such declaration.

In my own case, I was tutored by Munro Leaf, and my own son is tutored by one of the Mansfields and a Harmsworth too (yep - Fleming and Charteris and all of that).