How did critic Robert Greene call Shakespeare?

Answer 1

He called him "an upstart crow". The "upstart" is because Shakespeare had not attended University, whereas playwrights like Marlowe, Nashe and Greene himself were all University men, and were later called the "University Wits." The "crow" may have been a reference to Shakespeare's jet-black hair (as seen in the Chandos portrait) which even in 1592 would have been receding. Greene also called him a "Johannes Factotum" or jack-of-all-trades, because he was both an actor and a playwright. And finally, he called him the "greatest Shake-scene in the country" which is not only a pun on Shakespeare's name but also a suggestion that his work was bombastic. And although the plays which Shakespeare was writing at the time, like the Henry VI plays, were pretty bombastic, so also were those of Marlowe and Greene himself. Greene alludes to Henry VI Part 3 by saying Shakespeare had a "tygers hart wrapt in a players hide", a clear reference to one of the Duke of York's lines in the play. It really seemed to irritate Greene that Shakespeare was writing plays when he was only an actor.