Blue Boar Tavern coming up!

“Your own handwriting would tell you what I think.”

– Comedy of Errors, III.i

Despite 400 years of searching, no letters, manuscripts, plays, poems, notes or marginalia exist in Will of Stratford’s handwriting, much less any proof that his hand penned Shakespeare’s plays.

But can any of Will’s 16th century contemporaries stake a better claim that their handwriting proves they penned the greatest literature in the English language?

You do not want to miss this next episode of the Blue Boar Tavern! On February 5, 2025, at 8:00 pm Eastern and 5:00 pm Pacific, Professor Roger Stritmatter returns with Blue Boar Tavern regulars, Bonner Cutting, Dorothea Dickerman, Alex McNeil, Phoebe Nir and multi-talented bartender Jonathan Dixon.

In his 2024 Blue Boar Tavern appearance, Professor Stritmatter discussed his research at Audley End in Essex, England.  Audley End was owned by Thomas Howard when it was a key stop during Queen Elizabeth I’s Summer Progress of 1578 at which Edward de Vere was in attendance. In the library Dr. Stritmatter located handwritten 16th century marginalia in period sources for Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra that contained unique details identical to details Shakespeare wrote into the plays themselves. From his research, we know what Shakespeare was thinking when he researched and wrote those plays.

Dr. Stritmatter left us last year with an unanswered question: whose handwriting was it in that marginalia? This year, he returns to discuss the answer with now-completed, independent, expert forensic handwriting analysis. Can forensic handwriting experts definitively tie the handwriting in the Audley End marginalia to a specific 16th century individual? If that individual is positively identified, have we finally identified the person who wrote masterpieces under the pseudonym“William Shakespeare”?

You have to be there to find out by clicking the link that will be sent out on February 5th.