That was the message of greatest virtue which these
halting chroniclers delivered.
In Shakespeare's case their message was not long neglected. In 1709
Nicholas Rowe, afterwards George the First's poet laureate, published
the first professed biography of the poet. The eminence of the
subject justified such alacrity, and it had no precise parallel. More
or less definite lives of a few of Shakespeare's great literary
contemporaries followed his biography at long intervals. But the whole
field has never been occupied by the professed biographer. In some
cases the delay has meant loss of opportunity for ever. Very many
distinguished Elizabethan and Jacobean authors have shared the fate of
John Webster, next to Shakespeare the most eminent tragic dramatist of
the era, of whom no biography was ever attempted, and no positive
biographic fact survives.
But this is an imperfect statement of the advantages which
Shakespeare's career enjoyed above that of his fellows from the
commemorative point of view. Although formal biography did not lay
hand on his name for nearly a century after his death, the authentic
tradition of his life and work began steadily to crystallise in the
minds and mouths of men almost as soon as he drew his last breath.
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