THE SALOMÉ INSTITUTE of JUNGIAN STUDIES

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Was Shakespeare a Woman?

Satya Doyle Byock

June 15, 2023

I read an article in The Atlantic back in 2020 that I still think about all the time called Was Shakespeare a Woman?

What starts as a kind of curious investigation ends up being an unbelievably convincing argument. You may have read it back then too because this piece got an enormous amount of attention. The author, Elizabeth Winkler, received both praise and, yes, vitriol for a meticulously researched and exquisitely written article because she dared to suggest the (very real) possibility that the man William Shakespeare, who had no education at all and whose parents, wife, and children were illiterate, did not actually write the plays attributed to his name, and that instead, a highly educated, upper-class woman used his name as a front to get her own work published and performed.

Whew!

I think about this article all the time because its very possibility shakes the ground on which we walk, potentially upending any argument about the intellectual supremacy of the male mind when the man second only to Jesus for the amount that he is read, quoted, and revered might be… a woman?

Anyway, I was thinking of sending this article to you a few weeks ago when I popped into a bookstore to browse. I told myself I wasn’t going to buy a thing because I had just bought a stack of books from the same wonderful bookstore a couple of days before. But as soon as I walked in, I saw a brand new book that I hadn’t known existed: Shakespeare Was a Woman: and Other Heresies by Elizabeth Winkler.

My jaw dropped.

I was thinking that very same day about her article years after reading it and then there was her new book! Of course, I had to buy it.

So I know I keep telling you about wonderful books that I’m reading, and maybe you’re sick of hearing about new books, but I just can’t help it. I love that these thinkers are out there. I love exploring their scholarship and love reading their writing. Shakespeare Was a Woman: and Other Heresies is, so far, an absolutely mind-expanding, remarkable work, just like the article that preceded it. If you’re looking for another summer read, I recommend it heartily.

xo, Satya

Satya Doyle Byock, Director of The Salome Institute of Jungian Studies

Upcoming Book Talks!

My book, Quarterlife, is coming out in paperback in July and I’ve got a few readings lined up at some of my favorite bookstores: