Camden to Charles 1
William Camden had finished his "Britannia" by 1617 (commenced in 1597), printed in 1625. He says of Stratford Church: "In the chancel lies William Shakespeare, a native of this place, who has given ample proof of his genius and great abilities in the forty-eight plays he has left behind him."
It is evident that the First Folio, 1623, was intended by his "fellows" at the Globe to stand as their monument to his memory, built of the plays that had become their private property by purchase. The verses that preface it, written by W. Basse, suggest that Shakespeare should have been buried by Chaucer, Spenser, Beaumont, in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. But the author withdraws his wish.
"Sleep, Brave Tragedian, Shakspere, sleep alone Thy unmolested rest, unshared cave Possess as Lord, not tenant to thy grave," etc.
Archy's "Banquet of Jests," printed in 1630, tells of one travelling through Stratford, "a town most remarkable for the birth of famous William Shakespeare." In the same year is said to have been written Milton's memorable epitaph (printed 1632), a noble testimony from the Puritan genius to the power of his play-acting brother:
"What needs my Shakspere for his honoured bones, The labour of an age in pilèd stones? Or that his hallowed reliques should be hid Under a star y-pointing pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What needst thou such weak witness of thy fame? Thou, in our wonder and astonishment, Hast built thyself a live-long monument," etc.
By 1651 had already been suggested an annual commemoration of his life in Samuel Sheppard's "Epigram on Shakspere," verse 6:
"Where thy honoured bones do lie, As Statius once to Maro's urn, Thither every year will I Slowly tread and sadly turn."
The State Papers even show the appreciation of his age.[174] But I was pleased to find that the first recorded student of Shakespeare was a woman. On January 21, 1638,[175] Madam Anne Merrick, in the country, wrote to a friend in London that she could not come to town, but "must content herself with the study of Shakespeare and the 'History of Women,'" which seem to have constituted all her country library. The Judges of King Charles I. reproached him with the study of Shakespeare's Plays
http://manybooks.net/pages/stopesc2631526315-8/77.html
It is evident that the First Folio, 1623, was intended by his "fellows" at the Globe to stand as their monument to his memory, built of the plays that had become their private property by purchase. The verses that preface it, written by W. Basse, suggest that Shakespeare should have been buried by Chaucer, Spenser, Beaumont, in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. But the author withdraws his wish.
"Sleep, Brave Tragedian, Shakspere, sleep alone Thy unmolested rest, unshared cave Possess as Lord, not tenant to thy grave," etc.
Archy's "Banquet of Jests," printed in 1630, tells of one travelling through Stratford, "a town most remarkable for the birth of famous William Shakespeare." In the same year is said to have been written Milton's memorable epitaph (printed 1632), a noble testimony from the Puritan genius to the power of his play-acting brother:
"What needs my Shakspere for his honoured bones, The labour of an age in pilèd stones? Or that his hallowed reliques should be hid Under a star y-pointing pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What needst thou such weak witness of thy fame? Thou, in our wonder and astonishment, Hast built thyself a live-long monument," etc.
By 1651 had already been suggested an annual commemoration of his life in Samuel Sheppard's "Epigram on Shakspere," verse 6:
"Where thy honoured bones do lie, As Statius once to Maro's urn, Thither every year will I Slowly tread and sadly turn."
The State Papers even show the appreciation of his age.[174] But I was pleased to find that the first recorded student of Shakespeare was a woman. On January 21, 1638,[175] Madam Anne Merrick, in the country, wrote to a friend in London that she could not come to town, but "must content herself with the study of Shakespeare and the 'History of Women,'" which seem to have constituted all her country library. The Judges of King Charles I. reproached him with the study of Shakespeare's Plays
http://manybooks.net/pages/stopesc2631526315-8/77.html
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