cover image The Shakespeare Transcripts

The Shakespeare Transcripts

Mark P. Friedlander, Jr.. Ox Bow Press, $24.95 (275pp) ISBN 978-0-918024-94-7

Clever and amusing, this deft debut mystery by lawyer Friedlander and literature professor Kenny draws a parallel between the effort of a pompous, egotistical professor to appropriate the work of a promising graduate student and Francis Bacon's attempt to steal the work of William Shakespeare. Dr. Ernest Dalrymple, ``a great walrus of a man,'' is a Renaissance scholar who hasn't produced an original work in a dozen years. Walter Sellars is the doctoral candidate, a Virginia farm boy and former football player whose brilliant dissertation he covets. Ellen Kolinsky, a lawyer, and her father Paul, seek Dalrymple's advice in tracing a reference in an 18th-century letter they own to Shakespeare's divorce decree. Convinced that the Church of England would not have granted a divorce to a vagabond like Shakespeare, Dalrymple suggests that Walter help them, hoping the young man will discredit himself. The search for the decree, from its start in the British Library to its auction-house conclusion, is suspenseful and fascinating. So is the historical tale, in which Bacon seeks an injunction against Shakespeare, who falls in love with his lawyer's daughter, whom he immortalizes as the dark lady of the sonnets. Dalrymple gets his just deserts and, though Will doesn't get his girl, Walter does. (Nov.)