Assuming that Shakespeare went to school (a reasonable assumption given his father's status) then he would have learnt to read and would also have learnt Latin. Add to that the fact that outstanding source material was available, and the logical assumption that whoever wrote the plays was a genius of Mozart's stature (with an exceptional ear for idiom etc), and it becomes perfectly reasonable that Shakespeare actually wrote his own plays, as was so widely assumed at the time.

Bald Eagle 2 keeps implying that Shakespeare's name was barely known to his contemporaries. He was in fact a close friend of Ben Johnson's as is plainly evident from the many references in Johnson's writings. Beaumont referred to Shakespeare as writing "by the dim light of nature" - ie writing without th benefit of university education, and "Venus and Adnnis" published in 1593 carried a dedication from "William Shakespeare" as did the Rape of Lucrece published soon afterwards. Robert Greene, one of the Cambridge writers, in his parody A Groat'sworth of Wit complained about the player Shakespeare trespassing on to the territory of the writers.

Even many of those who are desperate to believe in conspiracy theories have had to reject de Vere's candidacy on account of the irksome detail that he died in 1604, before some of the plays had been written. Of course, those who really cannot let go of the Oxfordian theory come up with all kinds of contrived explanations to for how the plays could in fact have been written sooner. But the plain fact is that Macbeth is a Gunpowder Plot play. It is not a play which has had plot references bolted on later; the plot (uncovered in 1605 in case anyone has not noticed the looming 400th anniversary) runs through it like "Blackpool" through a stick of rock.

Another point. Plays like Cymbeline were written and constructed for an indoor theatre. But then maybe de Vere wrote Cymbeline anticipating that four years after his death the King's Players would move to the indoor theatre at Blackfriars? I am tempted to think that those who want to believe are capable of believing just about anything.