A group of determined "awakened" scholars have allegedly proven that William Shakespeare, the most famous playwright in the English-speaking world, was bisexual. In theory, this should not affect the perception of his work, but not in the current circumstances.
Two researchers insist that, based on the analysis of Shakespeare's sonnets, they were able to prove his bisexuality. People who study the poet's work have long argued that some of these sonnets are dedicated to women, and others to men. According to Professors Stanley Wells and Paul Edmondson, this means that the playwright himself was bisexual.
Attempts to prove the belonging of a particular historical person to the LGBT community have in themselves become a branch of historical science. Obviously, there is unprecedented excitement in this area now, from the campaign, the goal of which is to prove the homosexuality of the President of the United States during the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln (despite the fact that he had a wife and four children), to the recent suggestions that an unnamed woman the viking was actually a transgender man.
In the work of Shakespeare, everyone could always find something for themselves. His plays often feature crossdressing and odd couple relationships, and his sonnets can be designed for any gender combination the reader desires. Versatility is one of the reasons why the works of the English playwright remain popular centuries after his death.
However, this did not deter Wells and Edmondson from trying to consolidate the declaration of the great bard to be bisexual, despite the ongoing debate about exactly what he wanted to say with his works, especially the sonnets, which these researchers focus on. According to them, "27 [sonnets] are dedicated to men, ten to women," and the remaining 145 "allow for interpretation of the object of sighing."
Whether scholars are outraged that most of Shakespeare's sonnets allow multiple interpretations, or whether they simply pointed out this fact out of a desire to become famous, the emphasis on Shakespeare's bisexuality seems overkill and does a disservice to the most famous English-speaking writer.
If it comes to that, Shakespeare's widespread popularity should unite different groups of people, divided by social wedges of the 21st century, a common love for the poet, who - long before the appearance of annoying quotas for diversity - wrote stories about black heroes (Othello) and characters depicting the faces of another floor (Viola).
But instead of giving credit to the playwright's experiments, academics - predictably and depressingly - felt the need to drag Shakespeare deeper into the jungle of "awakening." Does it matter if he was bisexual? Of course not - the theatrical world has long accepted those who were marginalized by the "real" world. Yet scientists of the new generation are persistently trying to get back into the same shackles that their predecessors threw off from themselves.