Shakespeare was an Italian sausage maker

Warlike sheep salami – that’s an anagram of William Shakespeare, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s conclusive proof that the Bard was, in fact, a bad-tempered, mutton-loving, Italian sausage maker…or something.

There are other theories, of course.

The makers of a recent film claim that Will was just an illiterate Warwickshire rustic on the make, and didn’t write the plays which bear his name. They’ve spent a vast amount of money on promotion – press, TV and radio advertisements.

They even got some free help to promote their film - from the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, who went to great lengths to draw attention to the film’s premiere, by taping over the word “Shakespeare” on some road signs and generally making a bit of a fuss.

One is tempted to blame the Americans. They love a good (or rubbish) conspiracy theory. But they’re not the real culprits.

The Earl of Oxford theory has been doing the rounds, along with a few dozen other theories, for a couple of hundred years.

It’s based mainly on the snobbish assumption that only an educated nobleman could have been responsible for such creative and beautiful language…certainly not a grammar school boy from the Midlands, of all places.

Maybe it’s time we hit back with a few of our own theories. For instance, we’ve studied the famous Gettysburg Address and there is incontrovertible evidence that Abraham Lincoln was from Wolverhampton. That’s a fact.