Who wrote Shakespeare's plays?

Answer 1

Shakespeare wrote his own plays. No- one else, such as Marlowe, helped.

It was all himself, he used to sit by the fire with his fountain pen writing, writing, writing away!

Some think that Francis Bacon wrote his plays but many other possibility's

Shakespeare did. Only a few conspiracy theorists think otherwise.

Answer 2

Shakespeare.

At least for the most part. We know that he worked with other playwrights on some of the plays and suspect that others were also collaborations. Other people have revised and gone over the plays as well, sometimes before the first time they got into print.

Some people try to imagine some other person writing Shakespeare's plays, usually because they don't like who Shakespeare was and want to believe that the greatest writer in history was more aristocratic, more educated, more spiritual, more handsome or more female than Shakespeare really was. They make up "facts" and create incoherent arguments to support their claims. Here are some sample arguments:

1. He was illiterate. Except that we have samples of his handwriting which prove that he went to school. The truth is: he was literate.
2. He was known as a buisnessman in his home town. However, the statue in Stratford Church has an inscription which describes him as a poet. At least his family knew what he was famous for. In fact, there is no evidence that anyone in Stratford thought of him as anything other than a writer. The truth is: he was famous for being a writer in his lifetime and immediately after his death.
3. He left no manuscripts in his will and none of his plays are mentioned as being in his house. Well, of course not. His plays were the property of his Theatre Company, not him. As for manuscripts of plays, hardly any manuscript copies of any plays from the sixteenth century exist any more. Why did he not mention books in his will? Maybe he borrowed them rather than buying (good books could be pricey and cheap ones weren't worth keeping).
4. A statue was put up in Stratford church 15 years after he passed away. It showed his hands resting on a sack (a sign of tradesmen) not a pen. Sorry. The statue is of Shakespeare, and the verses on it say right out that he was famous as an author. It was put up by his family within a few years of his death, certainly less than seven. Other people who saw it at the time describe it as being a statue of the famous poet Shakespeare. You can look at the statue any time: his hands rest on a pillow and he has a pen in his right hand. There is a piece of paper under his left hand. The truth is: the Stratford monument shows him as a writer and has done so practically since Shakespeare died.