"Tis just what I sought for my Facebook homepage or what I ought to have grace the drop of the back stage" the Bard said last night...er...via Thora Spectre, medium to the stars.
The portrait, unveiled yesterday at a press conference in London, shows a Hunky Shakespeare with an aquiline nose and a dark, thick head of hair.
A bit of "a pinup" as Shakespeare historian Stanley Wells told the New York Times.
Some Historians claim the rendering might be the only known portrait painted during the playwright's lifetime, and was painted only a few years before his death.
It was amongst a rich Irish family's art collection for nearly 300 years and was given to them by a literary patron of Shakespeare's. Some scholars at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, which is showing the painting at an exhibit in April, claim that patron was his lover.
Their press handout gushes:-
"This Shakespeare is handsome and glamorous, so how does this change the way we think about him? And do the painting and provenance tell us more about his sexuality, and possibly about the person to whom the sonnets are addressed?"
So what sayeth you, oh sweet fair maidens of scribesville?
Real Shakey: Hunk, Bunk or Junk?
4 comments:
I don't think it can be trusted as a true representation - artists often painted the sitters in order to make them look good, so how do we know this didn't happen here?
Also, do we trust written descriptions or paintings more? I think that perhaps written descriptions paint a better picture.
Is it just me or does anyone else think that this is just as likely to be a portrait of Southampton? No-one knows for sure what he looked like either. But he was a lot younger and apparently a fitty.
Personally, if we're never going to know one way or t'other, I rather prefer the version of Will with an earring.
So these ladies are aroused by a nifty pointy beard and a devilish golden ear piece...
Any more lovely maidens fond of Will?
If i was 500 years younger....personally, i think it could be Southampton, but more probably, Raleigh.
Damned fine speciman of of a man, whoever he is.
SHxx
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