author
Delia Salter Bacon
1811–1859
A fiercely original 19th-century American writer, she is remembered for turning literary history into a bold argument. Her work on the Shakespeare authorship question made her one of the most unusual and debated literary thinkers of her time.
2 Audiobooks
The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded
by Delia Salter Bacon
The Bride of Fort Edward: Founded on an Incident of the Revolution
by Delia Salter Bacon
About the author
Delia Salter Bacon was an American writer, lecturer, and literary thinker born in 1811 in Tallmadge, Ohio, and raised largely in Connecticut. Before she became known for literary controversy, she worked as a teacher and wrote plays and stories, building a reputation as an intelligent and independent voice.
She is best remembered for advancing an early theory that the plays attributed to William Shakespeare were actually written by a group of authors that included Francis Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, and others. That idea was highly controversial, but it brought her lasting attention in literary history. Her major book, The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded (1857), was published with a preface by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Though many of her conclusions were rejected, her determination and originality made her an important figure in the long debate over Shakespearean authorship. Today she is often remembered not only for the theory itself, but for the intensity, ambition, and independence she brought to literary criticism at a time when few women were able to claim such a public intellectual role.