If the nation undertook to
commemorate Shakespeare at all, it should make its first aim (it was
argued) the conversion into public property of the surviving memorials
of Shakespeare's career at Stratford. The scheme of the London
memorial could not be thoroughly discussed on its merits while the
claims of Stratford remained unsatisfied. It was deemed premature,
whether or no it were justifiable, to entertain any scheme of
commemoration which left the Stratford buildings out of account.
A natural sentiment connected Shakespeare more closely with
Stratford-on-Avon than with any other place. Whatever part London
played in his career, the public mind was dominated by the fact that
he was born at Stratford, died, and was buried there. If he left
Stratford in youth in order to work out his destiny in London, he
returned to it in middle life in order to end his days there "in ease,
retirement, and the conversation of his friends."
In spite of this widespread feeling, it proved no easy task, nor one
capable of rapid fulfilment, to consecrate in permanence to public
uses the extant memorials of Shakespeare at Stratford-on-Avon.
Stratford was a place of pilgrimage for admirers of Shakespeare from
early days in the seventeenth century--soon, in fact, after
Shakespeare's death in 1616.
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