Celebrities spend a lot of time signing autographs, but besides personal value the ones that really end up being worth lots of cold hard cash are the rarest ones. In today's day and age it's hard to get through a single day sometimes without signing for a credit card purchase or something else, but hundreds of years ago things were different. Even for somebody who spent most of his time with a quill in his hand.
For all the writing William Shakespeare did he apparently didn't sign his name very often. Today there are only six of the playwright's known authenticated signatures in existence, which helps make his John Hancock one of the most valuable in the world. One can be found on a conveyance for a house in London, one on a legal deposition, one on his mortgage documents, and three in his will. And any one of those is worth $3 million, seriously.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
9-25-2007 @ 12:35PM
Eric said...
His signature may not be worth very much for long. There is currently a group of eminent scholars and actors (Shakespearean) who have come forth in the past few months to declare that they believe William Shakespeare did not write all the works attributed to him. Although they cite much "evidence" in support of their claim, the most persuasive of those is the question of how Shakespeare, who was not an educated man, could have known enough about such topics as law, politics (especially in foregin countries), etc., to write as intricately and as detailed as he supposedly did. In other words, the group of scholars/thespians claim that because Shakespeare was not formally educated, there is really no way he could have possessed the requisite information about any number of subjects which are featured in the writings attributed to him.
Perhaps that signature isn't worth as much as once was thought?!?
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9-25-2007 @ 1:46PM
Suzanne said...
Well Eric, it's a good thing we have people as smart as you to set us straight.
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9-25-2007 @ 7:06PM
marggus said...
Alas poor Eric. Casting slings and arrows of outrageous.. supposition. Suffering long with such anal porishness, to thy self be true. Looking long and without fett to your pithless vision, your course doomed to be one of self gratification, nary a partner to jointly succumb, a sole short effort.. Ignoramus idiotum.
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9-26-2007 @ 12:26AM
Red1NFla said...
dumb idiot...ignoramus idiotum...double negatives...shakespeare might not have written all that yahoo...who cares...yaaawwn.
who is the fool that would pay 3m for anyones signature?
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9-26-2007 @ 3:42PM
Rick said...
Sorry but that's not Bill's signature. Bill always used a Corolla Typewriter with a FICA 12 font. So, don't buy it. It's a fraud!
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9-27-2007 @ 3:07AM
ericnda626 said...
Shut up you dumb idiot.
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1-29-2008 @ 9:45PM
DDias said...
Right Eric, however, Einstein was a high school drop out and he wrote the theory of relativity. What would the same "scholars" say about that?????
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2-11-2008 @ 7:05AM
charles hedbring said...
Oh yes, and how do some autistic students, totally untrained and with exquisite spontaneity, compose music, create beautiful paintings, write incredible prose, display voluminous memories, and yes, quote Shakespeare endlessly? Longtime NYC autistic teacher, charlie hedbring
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2-22-2008 @ 9:45AM
John S said...
Marggus' comment is very typical of those of the "Orthodox" persuasion...long on invective and pitifully short on facts. It is obvious, even to someone lacking expertise in handwriting analysis, that whomever signed this was functionally illiterate. The other five signatures are worse. This is the best one. Most of the others are incomplete scribbles and hardly proof of authorship.
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