HUGH CRAIG and ARTHUR F. KINNEY (eds), Shakespeare, Computers and the Mystery of Authorship.
Thomas Merriam · Notes and Queries · 2010
IT is inevitable that a comparison will be made between this trim volume of nine or ten essays, and its large predecessor, Brian Vickers’s Shakespeare Co-Author. In establishing Shakespearian co-authorship as a respected concept, Vickers relied on an extensive and dispersed body of earlier research. With 86 tables dating from 1850 to 2002, and two diagrams, its generally precedent-based argument is impressive. By contrast, Shakespeare, Computers and the Mystery of Authorship with 17 tables and 54 diagrams makes an incisive case for Shakespearian co-authorship. Despite an enormous hinterland of computerized data on tap, its authors demonstrate co-authorship with skill and elegance of presentation. The analogy that springs to mind is key-hole surgery. Craig and Kinney adopt Harold Love’s distinction between personal idiolect and sociolect. ‘A personal idiolect individualizes the sociolect.’ In other words, the same language dictates features by virtue of commonly shared characteristics. Each individual, however, filters these to favour elements peculiar to his own cerebral wiring. This of course is the axiom of any stylometric approach to authorship discrimination.