Annual Meeting for SOF Members on Oct. 2; Free Symposium Oct. 8–9 Will Showcase Video Contest Winners, Tom Regnier Veritas Award, and Oxfordian of the Year
The 2021 SOF Annual Conference will be highlighted by more than a dozen speakers from across North America, including a panel with authors Michael Blanding, Dennis McCarthy, Prof. Bryan H. Wildenthal, and Bob Meyers on the claim by McCarthy — discussed in Blanding’s book North by Shakespeare — that the translator Sir Thomas North wrote plays on which canonical “Shakespeare” works were based. The panel will discuss the evidence relating to the North theory and compare it to the evidence supporting Edward de Vere (Earl of Oxford) as the true “Shakespeare.”
(Updates: Please note one schedule change. Session Three on Saturday, October 9, will begin one hour earlier than previously announced, at 4:00 pm Eastern, concluding at 7:15 pm. For full schedule details and to register, please click here. We have also published a full-color syllabus with the schedule and all speaker biographies, abstracts, and photographs.)
The free public symposium (Friday–Saturday, Oct. 8–9), held on Zoom and open to all, will also showcase the winners of this year’s international SOF Video Contest — voting is still open until Sept. 20 — the second Tom Regnier Veritas Award, and the 2021 Oxfordian of the Year.
SOF members will be updated by email on the Annual Meeting scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 2 (also via Zoom), at 1:00 pm Eastern (10:00 am Pacific), lasting between 60 and 90 minutes.
The SOF Fall 2021 Fundraising Appeal, with thank-you gifts at various levels, will remain open throughout the conference and until Oct. 15, and includes a special reduced-price gift offer for anyone newly joining the SOF during this period.
On the symposium’s opening night, Bob Meyers will host an “Authorship 101” session including videos by the late Tom Regnier and actor Keir Cutler, and John M. Shahan speaking about the Shakespeare Authorship Coalition and the Declaration of Reasonable Doubt and answering questions from viewers.
The early Saturday session — hosted by 2019 Oxfordian of the Year Cheryl Eagan-Donovan — will feature Ben August on Oxford’s 1565 volume on the Greek and Persian wars, Dr. Earl Showerman on Titus Andronicus, Katherine Chiljan on a newly discovered portrait of Oxford’s sister, Prof. Roger Stritmatter on Cleopatra and the authorship question, and Dr. Elisabeth P. Waugaman on French academics and Shakespeare. This session will conclude with James A. Warren discussing the greatest deception in literary history.
The final Saturday session — hosted by Prof. Don Rubin — will feature Prof. Michael Delahoyde on Twelfth Night from an Oxfordian perspective, Prof. Richard M. Waugaman on Oxford as translator of The Decameron, and Michael Dudley on Stratfordian epistemology and the ethics of belief. This session will conclude, as mentioned above, with the North-Oxford panel, the Video Contest winners, and the Veritas and Oxfordian of the Year awards.
Click here for required free registration and more details.
[published Sept. 17, 2021; originally announced July 10, 2021; updated Oct. 6, 2021]
