Published: 5 March 2016
Last updated: 4 March 2024
Alan Gold reviews 'Was Shakespeare a Jew?'
by Dr Ghislain Muller, Edwin Mellen 2011
When I first read Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice at school, I was convinced that the Bard was an antisemite, in the very best tradition of Elizabethan England. King Edward I, after all, had expelled the Jews from England three hundred years earlier and, except for a handful, there were no Jews left on the island.
Since my schooldays, I’ve seen the Merchant many times, and as I grow older and theatre directors reinterpret Shylock’s and Portia’s roles and motivations within the play, the Jew is becoming more the victim than the perpetrator.
That’s the universal genius of Shakespeare; that he can be interpreted and re-interpreted by successive generations as attitudes change and social influences alter perspectives.
Which is why it’s always enlightening to read the new interpretation of an acclaimed scholar, dealing with unanswerable and perpetually challenging questions about one of the greatest writers in the literary canon. And Ghislain Muller’s book, Was Shakespeare a Jew?, which traces the Marrano influences in his life and writing, is certainly an absorbing read.
Until quite recently, no Shakespeare scholars have gone beyond the unquestioned assumption that Shakespeare was a Christian. They’ve investigated his identity, his birthplace, his sexuality and much else. Indeed, a grand total of 80 different identities have been suggested as alternative authors of the plays, most popular candidates being Francis Bacon, Edward de Vere (the 17th Earl of Oxford), Christopher Marlowe, and William Stanley (the 6th Earl of Derby).
With recently developed techniques of textual analysis, scholars are now interpreting his words, phrases and characterisations to give greater insight into the man himself. Yet until very recently, the furthest which any scholar was willing to go was to label Shakespeare as a crypto-Catholic in an England where Protestantism was not only the dominant religion, but one which was rigidly enforced, especially after the reign of Bloody Mary.
Which brings us back to The Merchant of Venice. Was it an antisemitic play? Or was Shakespeare, a covert Jew, pleading with his fellow Elizabethans for the rehabilitation of his people after so many antisemitic representations in earlier plays? In recent times, scholars have examined Shakespeare’s works as being influenced by the Kabbalah, such as in the riddles in Richard III, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night, positing the theory that these are Hebrew puns or, indeed, kabbalistic messages. And what does this mean? Presumably that Shakespeare was very familiar with the Hebrew language, culture and especially the esoterica of the Kaballah.
But the author of Was Shakespeare a Jew? goes much further. Dr. Muller utilises a depth of scholarship, research and close reading to determine that our William not only knew much about Jews and Jewish culture, but that he, himself, was a Jew.
England wasn’t totally empty of Jews in Shakespeare’s day, nor indeed since the expulsion in 1290. Some Jews may have remained and gone underground, as did the Marranos in Spain and Portugal; some may have travelled from overseas to trade; some may have resettled in England when the older monarchs had died away. And there was certainly an influx of Marrano Jews masquerading as Christians into England after 1492 when they were expelled by Ferdinand and Isabella.
They came to England as Christians, hiding their Jewish identities and affinities, and were welcomed by Queen Elizabeth because of their international connections and their willingness to expand England’s trade overseas. And, of course, they were an important source of information for the English who saw Spain as their enemy.
Ghislain Muller’s book posits that Shakespeare’s family were among those crypto-Jews, and for reasons of social acceptance and advancement in his profession, he carefully hid his identity. Which, of course, goes back to his father John Shakespeare. There are certain years in young William’s life which are virtually lost to us and for which we have little or no record. Muller’s contention that the Shakespeare family were crypto-Jewish is given further credence by the assumption that John took his son William out of school for some years, and gave him a private home education in the Jewish faith.
With this knowledge gained, as he grew and became recognised as a playwright, Muller shows that Shakespeare’s friendships were increasingly connected with Jews and Judaism.
Through examination of the text of Shakespeare’s plays, and through a re-interpretation of his life and society, Ghislain Muller draws fairly faint and disparate straws together to posit a thesis which most will reject. Yet it is a gripping, if scholarly, analysis and one which will certainly add to the darkness surrounding one of the most illuminating creators of all time.
This The Jewish Independent article may be republished if acknowledged thus: “This article first appeared on www.thejewishindependent.com.au and is reprinted with permission."
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