A Review Of A Landmark Collection of Shakespearean Essays

Confessions of a Shakespeare Addict. V S Ravi. Creative Workshop, 2025. Pages 308. Rs 500.

V S Ravi is well known to the readers of Swarajya. As a writer his interests span diverse domains. But chief among them is Shakespeare.

The former Indian Police Service (IPS) officer-turned-author-columnist has now come with the book, Confessions of a Shakespeare Addict, which was launched in Hyderabad on July 7, 2025.

This collection of 72 articles, large and small, on William Shakespeare is not a conventional academic study; it is a deeply personal work of intellectual devotion.

The author’s voice emerges as that of a "rational devotee"—a figure whose profound personal reverence for the Bard is matched only by their scholarly rigour. The unique power of this volume stems from this very fusion of heartfelt passion with formidable intellect.

The book's true genius lies in its rhetorical structure. The author first appears not as a detached academic, but as a passionate pilgrim, recounting their eleven journeys to Stratford-upon-Avon—a self-proclaimed "record for a tourist"—and a transcendent theatrical experience watching Sir Lawrence Olivier and Vivian Leigh in Antony and Cleopatra.

By establishing these credentials of heartfelt devotion, the author earns the reader's trust. Consequently, when the chapters pivot to dense, scholarly refutations of authorship theories, the arguments feel less like dry pedantry and more like a personal testament—a defence of a cherished belief.

This strategy persuades the heart in order to convince the mind, making the book both emotionally compelling and intellectually authoritative. Identifying as a ‘devotee of the Bard’ and framing the work as an obsession, the author positions personal passion as the engine for intellectual inquiry, inviting the reader on a journey that is at once scholarly and spiritual.

Devoted as he is to the bard, the author never allows the passion to take over his reason. In fact he employs reason with utmost effectiveness in the direction of his heart.

In Defence of the Bard: A Formidable Rebuttal to the Doubters

The case in point is the comprehensive, passionate, and multi-pronged defence of Shakespeare's authorship that this collection offers. It is nothing short of a tour de force.

The author declares a clear mission to ‘destroy this myth’ of alternative authorship, framing the debate in moral and historical terms lest ‘posterity will never forgive us’.

What follows is a sophisticated demonstration of rhetorical strategy, with the argumentative style tailored to each specific opponent.

The demolition of the Baconian theory is relentless and devastating. It attacks Francis Bacon on multiple fronts: his corrupt character as a ‘scheming politician, a courtier, a time-server... and a corrupt judge’; his profound scientific ignorance, cataloguing his pseudoscientific beliefs about quicksilver being the coldest metal and tortoises having no bones; his shallow and dismissive view of love; and the utter lack of any documentary evidence linking him to the plays.

The author points out the absurdity of the notion that Bacon would have ‘left the wondrous children of his brain on the door-step of Shakespeare, and kept the deformed ones at home’. The final verdict, comparing Shakespeare's best to Bacon's, is a crushing dismissal: ‘like a domed temple above a beggar’s hut’.

For Christopher Marlowe, the refutation is more elegant and precise, presented as a ‘silver bullet’. The author claims a unique insight that ‘even many eminent and knowledgeable Shakespearean scholars have missed’: the tribute paid by Ben Jonson.

The argument is that Jonson’s poem, ‘To the Memory of My Beloved the Author, Mr. William Shakespeare,’ serves as incontrovertible proof by explicitly naming Marlowe and placing him in a hierarchy far below Shakespeare, dismissing ‘Marlowe’s mighty line’ as something the Bard far outshone.

This reliance on a close reading of a single, decisive contemporary document is an example textual argumentation.

Finally, against the modern Oxfordian theory centred on Edward De Vere, the book adopts a legalistic and evidence-focused strategy. Citing scholars Michael LoMonico and Louis Marder, it presents a systematic, point-by-point rebuttal, repeating the powerful refrain, ‘There is no evidence to prove...’.

This dismantles specific claims through his supposed legal education, the alleged destruction of records, and the sprawling conspiracy of silence, demonstrating a commanding grasp of contemporary scholarly debate.

This variation in approach reveals the author not merely as a scholar, but as a master debater.

A Masterclass in Verse: Unlocking the Power of the Great Speeches

The centrepiece of this collection, and arguably its most invaluable contribution, is the extensive chapter dedicated to line-by-line analyses of Shakespeare's greatest speeches. This section serves as an essential guide for any serious reader, unlocking the psychological depth, rhetorical brilliance, and sheer musicality of the verse.

In a masterful curatorial choice, the author assembles a ‘best of’ anthology of critical thought, explicitly crediting experts like Oliver Tearle, Krupa Patel, and Roli Edema for their detailed breakdowns. This positions the book not as a singular voice, but as an authoritative and indispensable resource compiling the most lucid and powerful analyses available.

The depth of this analysis is particularly evident in the exploration of Othello.

The book offers a brilliant breakdown of Othello's initial address to the Venetian senate, charting his subtle shift from a flattering statesman to a noble warrior presenting a ‘round unvarnished tale’. It then plumbs the psychological turmoil of his chilling ‘It is the cause’ soliloquy, exploring its biblical cadence and the grotesque rationalisations of a man trying to summon conviction for murder.

The interpretation of his final speech—‘I kiss’d thee ere I kill’d thee’—and its powerful connection to the ultimate betrayal of Judas's kiss is cited as an example of the book's profound interpretive power.

Similar insight is brought to other canonical works. The analysis of Macbeth's ‘Two truths are told’ aside masterfully charts the ‘beginning of Macbeth’s decline’, as his thought becomes ‘smothered in surmise’ and he descends into mental insecurity.

The exploration of Hamlet's tortured ‘Get thee to a nunnery’ speech and Ophelia's subsequent lament (‘O, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown!’) provides a sensitive handling of feigned versus real madness, misogyny, and psychological distress.

The iconic ‘St Crispin’s Day Speech’ from Henry V is celebrated for its unpacking of Henry's rhetorical genius in forging a ‘band of brothers’, while the analyses of Portia's ‘The quality of mercy’ and Jacques' ‘All the world's a stage’ are lauded for their thematic richness. This chapter is a veritable masterclass in close reading, transforming familiar passages into fresh revelations.

The Universal Mind: Shakespeare as Philosopher and Scientist

The book makes its boldest and most provocative claims in positioning Shakespeare's intellect as so vast that it transcended the arts to encroach upon the domains of philosophy and science, often anticipating discoveries and theories by centuries. The book supports this with a series of potent quotes on love (‘Love is not love / Which alters when it alteration finds’), the nature of reality (‘There is nothing either good or bad... but thinking makes it so’), and the human condition from his plays and sonnets.

Even more audacious is the chapter on Shakespeare's ‘Scientific Temper’.

This article argues that Shakespeare’s intuitive understanding of the natural world and human psychology prefigured formal scientific discovery. For instance, at a time when the great astronomer Johannes Kepler was a practicing astrologer, Shakespeare had Cassius declare in Julius Caesar, ‘The fault dear Brutus lies not in our stars / But in ourselves’.

In the same play, written in 1599, Brutus speaks of the ‘ruddy drops that visit my sad heart’, an incredible turn of phrase that seems to anticipate William Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of blood in 1628. Hamlet's description of man as ‘the paragon of animals’ is interpreted as a pre-Darwinian grasp of humanity's place in the biological order.

The analysis extends to psychology, hailing the doctor's advice in Macbeth—‘therein the patient must minister to himself’—as ‘pure modern psychoanalysis’ that predates Freud by centuries. Similarly, Richard III's monologue on his own deformity is presented as a perfect illustration of Alfred Adler’s inferiority complex theory.

The ultimate purpose of these arguments is to champion the supremacy of poetic and humanistic understanding over empirical science. The author consistently pits Shakespeare's intuitive knowledge against the formal learning of his era.

This culminates in the chapter ‘My Magnificent Obsession’, where the author explicitly states that the thrill of reading Shakespeare surpasses the delight of understanding Einstein, Dirac, or Crick. The argument is not just that Shakespeare was a scientist, but that his mode of understanding—the poet's ‘fine frenzy’—represents a more profound way of knowing the world than the scientific method itself.

Conclusion: A Monument for a Modern Age

This collection succeeds in its ultimate goal: to affirm the absolute and enduring supremacy of William Shakespeare. It is far more than a relic of the past; it is a vital intervention in contemporary debates, offering a powerful defence of his genius and relevance for our time.

The book courageously engages with the ‘Decolonising Shakespeare’ movement, directly refuting charges of racism and sexism. It marshals compelling evidence from the texts themselves: Shylock's searing plea for common humanity (‘Hath not a Jew eyes?’), the central interracial love story of Othello and Desdemona, and the creation of fiercely independent and powerful female characters like Cleopatra and Lady Macbeth who defy the patriarchal norms of their era.

Beyond these critical debates, the book shows a practical concern for new generations of readers. By including Bertrand Russell's advice and the humorous ‘Shakespeare's Ghost’ poem, the author seeks to rescue the Bard from the ‘pedantic boredom’ of the classroom and restore the ‘jollity’ and ‘delight’ inherent in the plays. It is a guide for how to approach Shakespeare not as a chore, but as a source of unparalleled joy and wisdom.

In the final analysis, this book is more than a collection of essays. It is a unified, impassioned, and meticulously argued case for Shakespeare as one of the pinnacles of human intellectual and artistic achievement.

The various photos which are related to different historical places and facsimiles associated with the bard where the author has personally visited add a further touch of heart to the book. The book circles back to the author's ‘Magnificent Obsession’, leaving the reader with two declarations that encapsulate its spirit. The first is Sir Lawrence Olivier's awe-struck description of Shakespeare as ‘the nearest thing in incarnation to the eye of God’.

The second is Robert Ingersoll's magnificent tribute, which serves as the perfect summation of the man and his work: ‘an intellectual ocean, whose waves touched all the shores of thought’.

This volume makes the value of that eternal monument clearer and more vital than ever before.