Relative contributions of Shakespeare and Fletcher in Henry VIII: An analysis based on most frequent words and most frequent rhythmic patterns

0533327 - ÚČL 2022 RIV GB eng J - Journal Article
Plecháč, Petr
Relative contributions of Shakespeare and Fletcher in Henry VIII: An analysis based on most frequent words and most frequent rhythmic patterns.
Digital Scholarship in the Humanities. Roč. 36, č. 2 (2021), s. 430-438. ISSN 2055-7671. E-ISSN 2055-768X
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA17-01723S
Institutional support: RVO:68378068
Keywords : William Shakespeare * John Fletcher * Henry VIII * stylometry * authorship attribution
OECD category: Specific literatures
Impact factor: 1.299, year: 2021
Method of publishing: Limited access
https://academic.oup.com/dsh/article-abstract/36/2/430/5862919

The versified play Henry VIII is nowadays widely recognized to be a collaborative work not written solely by William Shakespeare. We employ combined analysis of vocabulary and versification together with machine learning techniques to determine which other authors took part in the writing of the play and what were their relative contributions. Unlike most previous studies, we go beyond the attribution of particular scenes and use the rolling attribution approach to determine the probabilities of authorship of pieces of texts, without respecting the scene boundaries. Our results highly support the canonical division of the play between William Shakespeare and John Fletcher proposed by James Spedding, but also bring new evidence supporting the modifications proposed later by Thomas Merriam.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0321894