Good. 
Actually on a serious note I did read once that just before his death Shakespeare was working on Cervantes play. I do not have the reference to such story so as to back up what I have just said. Whether Shakespeare could speak Spanish, or Cervantes English is neither here or there, communications in those days were sufficiently good so that they could have read each other’s work.
Well tbh I read some conjecture somewhere that says Shakespeare didn’t write all of his plays is about the extent of the so called reasoned evidence here. So you can either accept that even in history assertions need good evidence or you can accept that some guy saying something at some time, that didn’t really have the evidence warrants further examination. The claim made was specifically saying he did not do his own work (I am willing to accept he plagiarised, everyone does to some extent no man is an island, and still does, although these days it’s good form to reveal your sources, either by saying I was a huge fan of x as a child and drew a lot of inspiration from x, or crediting them directly). This whole thread is nothing but idle speculation, sure it’s great meat for a conspiracy theory, but none of the arguments so far hold any weight in academic circles, and I doubt if they continue to claim much but prove little, that they ever will.
One day someone will claim a 20th century author could not of been so fecund in his authorship, I have no doubt, and this argument will be had by our counterparts in that glorious 30th century, and it will be as much crap as it is now, then, but again riddled with more conjecture due to the passage of time. Fact is as time goes by and sources fail all things become doubted, but then they still need a source of conflict to be doubted, not a God of the gaps argument, or some crap about how no man can be that creative in the face of much more voluminous authors throughout all periods of history doing that. I as I said before think it is just some people cannot fathom that some people are supremely creative, because they think such a skill is magic. It is not, you could learn it yourself, creativity is a muscle not a preset condition of your birth, sure some may have a tendency to be more muscular than others but if you are uncreative, it means only that you choose to be, not that you cannot be, just like an 8 stone weakling can choose to be muscled like an athlete, so can any man develop a keen creative mind. We know Shakespeare did that, what we don’t know is exactly how and when his whole life happened, so we make up things to fit preconceived notions, often as not due to our own inadequacies. We like to mock genius, because it scares us, get enough scared people together and any wildly imagined idea is necessary, if only they chose to use that creative speculative power for good instead of backbiting eh?
I find that conclusion staggering.
Do I need to SPELL IT OUT.
Cervantes was not made available in ENGLISH until after Shakespeare died.
Communications might have been ‘good’, but as Cervantes was not available to WS, he was not able to work on a Cervantes play, unless you think they cracked telepathy.
Do you have any proof of this?
The first translation was in English, made by Thomas Shelton in 1608, but not published until 1612.
My understanding is that Shakespeare did not die until 1616.
You do realize if there are existing original manuscripts DNA might be pulled if who did what is all that important.
IMO at this point it is the work not the creator. The work now belongs to humanity as the natural heir.
Such manuscripts have been handled again and again for 100s of years. I think this bird has flown.
No what is important is the individual. Why? Because we have to prove that there has never a literary genius such as Shakespeare. And the key to this all is that he is English. If it turns out that his works are a collection of works of many, well there goes our literary genius.
Once when I was attending a science and engineering research council conference the speaker gave us this resounding summary, “we English are a nation of inventors and then others (hint, USA) market our inventions…”
No what is important is the individual. Why? Because we have to prove that there has never a literary genius such as Shakespeare. And the key to this all is that he is English. If it turns out that his works are a collection of works of many, well there goes our literary genius.
Once when I was attending a science and engineering research council conference the speaker gave us this resounding summary, “we English are a nation of inventors and then others (hint, USA) market our inventions…”
If they can date artifacts, there is a way to date DNA and also most DNA can be eliminated by nonrelation. But again, why really care?
Jabs, one person is many people. The work is important, that is the contribution to humanity.
You can’t date DNA as you think you can.
Dating an artifact requires the destruction of a small amount of the object.
DNA analysis does not render sufficient material for dating.
Furthermore - such dating methods are not accurate enough to distinguish from one generation to another.
Trust me, I’m an archaeologist
Ok good then since no certifiable, verifiable, noncontraversial evidence can be found then the argument is moot and the work gets the importance.
Right. Why should we care if those plays were written by Bacon, Marlowe or a Shakespeare club?
We really should not care.
You are very right who cares who wrote them, it is their human value that we should be interested in, but some people do care about who wrote them because that way they fly the nationalistic flag.
Vanity generally does cause problems. Is a perfect beautiful copy any less than the original? Only vanity makes the original work more valuable, monetarily wise that is. I have beautiful first edition books and original art. Only for the money. I have copies that I enjoy for enjoyment.
Here’s a list of people who literally shat on Shakespeare for maybe not all diversity of work (although some clearly did have diversity of thought coming out their wing wangs) but for sheer numbers of published works:
Isaac Asimov 506
Kutekei Bakin born 1767: 470+ published works
Alexander Dumas: 1802: 277 published works
Charles Hamilton : 1876 : 1200+ published works
Nicolea Iorga: 1871: 1359+ published works
Rolf Kamuczak: 1934: 2900+ published works
Ursula Bloom: 1892: 500+ published works
Corin Tellado: 1946: 4000+ novellas but we wont hold that against him now will we?
Mohammed Shirazi: 1928: 1150+
Lope De Vega: 1562: ~2200 plays
Shakespeare: 1654: 37 plays:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prolific_writers
Why don’t you people who mock, chastise all creative people while you are at it, and be consistent in that jibe. Start on these authors, some of them wrote on so many themes that it would bewilder you to even imagine one person could learn so much. Mohammed Shirazi wrote for example about such subjects as jurisprudence and theology to politics, economics, law, sociology and human rights. A broad body of work I think you will agree? What is the problem here seriously, I don’t get it? Are you just really just incredulous of of a person who wrote a smaller number of things about a smaller number of subjects than thousands of other authors who did far more and in some cases in a shorter time period, well are you?
And what have we got to show for this this: a load of conjecture a load of what if DNA magically appeared on originals that don’t even exist, a load of well if this happened and magically we knew this then, frankly this thread is a bit of a joke, I haven’t seen anything more than conjecture, word play or any logical semblance of anything remotely approaching a solidly evidential or logical argument since it started. It’s not big and clever to mock at a person with nothing substantial to show for it.
I tell you what tomorrow tackle all of the great and fecund writers not just these few who exceeded Shakespeare, let’s tackle every single one of them born before the 19th century, and then use the fact that no reliable exact published data exists as a means to demean creativity to all the people who surpassed Shakespeare without breaking a sweat. Let’s do that, let’s demean the whole creative process. ;D
No I don’t care if he wrote them, but so far I have seen absolutely no reason at all even remotely to imagine he did not. Would I care if he did not, no, I really wouldn’t, but I would like to see something more than well what ifs and if we had, and what if the magic texts and so on. Stroll on I think. 
Vanity is another nail in the coffin of reason, I suspect many people here are too vain to imagine anything more than their own small conceits: I cannot imagine one man could write 37 plays, well 4000+ works is going to take some people some time to encompass, and well 2200 plays near 100 years before Shakespeare was born, well I think that’s going to at least make people think especially given the sheer breadth and diversity of that man’s works. One can but live in hope. They were special you are not, I am not, it happens, some people are just unimaginably creatively clever. Live with it. 
oh dude I am extremely special. But, if my gifts can benefit humanity, I would obscure my name happily.