My next target is Shakespeare, died on the 23rd April almost 400 years ago! Talk about spotting dirt on this old guy…
With him, things started early and well: at the age of 18, he married the 26-year-old Anna Hathaway, already pregnant, a huge scandal then! Shakespeare’s father was a money lender and exploited people’s weaknesses demanding between 20% to 25% interest rate! Do you think Shakespeare’s father took Passos Coelho as his apprentice? That would definitely explain it… Shakespeare himself invested in property development and was known as a astute businessman in Stratford-upon-Avon. On his death, he left his daughter several lands and his wife “his second best bed”! Now when I read this, I thought to myself: you tight-fisted man, you Scrooge… But then a dear rumour-monger of mine reminded me that this was probably a little dirty gesture, since this bed must have been their marriage bed, where they had so much fun…
Despite having made the beast with two backs, he left to London to work at the theatre, visiting Stratford-upon-Avon once in a while, probably to conceive another child – they had 8, but only three survived, though all were illiterate! How could they? Shame on them…they should burn in hell for this, the same way those who dared move Shakespeare’s body from its grave in the Holy Trinity Church: “curst be he that moves my bones”!
In London, he must have had a whale of a time. He was an actor in his own plays at a time when only men could act and maybe in the midst of this cross-dressing he developed a flavour for youths… I wouldn’t put my hand in the fire for him, but I bet he was bi- and enjoyed both ends of the stick. Some of his sonnets tell of a “dark lady”, basically other women (yes, he is said to have an illegitimate child...), whereas others are for “the fair lord”. Many gossipers state this fair lord was Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, “the master-mistress of his passion”, also his patron. There is a very reputed sonnet, number 20, in which Shakespeare says his lord was intended to be a woman, until Nature made a mistake and added an extra thing (what do you think?! a penis, of course...) that prevented the poet from fully having his lord; and since Nature equipped his lord for women’s pleasure, he allows his lord to give women’s pleasure, but the poet must have his love! Some uphold that this was just platonic friendship among men, so typical of this time; I don’t buy it, he was an outright homo!
Last words for today, boys and girls from all over, stop sending letters at the thousands addressed to Romeo and Juliet, Venice, in Italy; they were mere characters in a play, fiction, you know... And even they were for real, they would dead: Romeo poisoned, Juliet with a dagger through her heart...
That’s all for now, folks. Don’t forget to send hot news to your Aunt Angelica, the unlicensed gossiper.
Angelica Holmes
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