Beatrice and Benedick (53 page)

We looked at the card; purchased in the north and first bestowed in Sicily, it had passed from me to him and back a dozen times. It had been to Spain, to Scotland and now it had
returned to Sicily. It had been the symbol of our merry war; but who was the victor? Who would keep the spoils, this saturated, sad piece of coloured card?

Then we looked at each other and began to smile. Hand to hand, complicit, we tore the card neatly in half; three and a half coins each.

And put each half in our bosoms, next to our hearts.

Beatrice's Sonnet

O! never say that I was false of heart,

Though absence seemed my flame to qualify,

As easy might I from my self depart

As from my soul which in thy breast doth lie:

That is my home of love: if I have ranged,

Like him that travels, I return again
;

Just to the time, not with the time exchanged,

So that myself bring water for my stain.

Never believe though in my nature reigned,

All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood,

That it could so preposterously be stained,

To leave for nothing all thy sum of good;

For nothing this wide universe I call,

Save thou, my rose, in it thou art my all.

In the course of research for this novel I visited a bustling little market town. The town itself is unremarkable except for a few historical buildings in its very centre. The thing that marks this town out from all others is its most famous son. The citizens talk of him as if they know him, with affection and palpable pride. ‘Oh yes,' said an elderly man to me on the street, ‘Shakespeare was from here.'

But this was not Stratford-upon-Avon, far from it.

This was Messina, Italy.

The actor Mark Rylance, Shakespearean extraordinaire and first artistic director of the Globe Theatre, says: ‘Anyone who claims to have written the plays of Shakespeare needs to show some Italian travel documents.' I myself am in absolutely no doubt that in his ‘lost years' Shakespeare, whoever he was, spent at least some of his time in Italy.

But what if we go a step farther? What if Shakespeare
was
Italian? This is the controversial theory put forth by Professor Martino Iuvara.

In his book
Shakespeare era Italiano
(2002), retired Sicilian professor Iuvara claims that Shakespeare was, in fact, not English at all, but Sicilian. His conclusion is drawn from research carried out from 1925 to 1950 by two professors at Palermo University. Iuvara posits that Shakespeare was born not in Stratford in April 1564, as is commonly believed, but in Messina as Michelangelo Florio Crollalanza. His parents were not John Shakespeare and Mary Arden, but were Dr Giovanni Florio, and Guglielma Crollalanza, a Sicilian noblewoman.

Crollalanza, literally
Crolla
(Shake)
lancia
(spear) according to Iuvara, studied abroad and was educated by Franciscan monks who taught him Latin, Greek and history.

Because of their Calvinist beliefs, Michelangelo Florio's family was persecuted by the Inquisition in Messina (then under the Spanish yoke) for alleged Calvinist propaganda. It seems that Giovanni Florio had published some sort of invective against Rome and the Church. The family supposedly departed Italy during the Holy Inquisition and moved to London. It was in London that Michelangelo Florio Crollalanza decided to change his surname to its English equivalent, and for his first name he ‘Englished' his mother's name Guglielma, to make William.

Iuvara's evidence includes a play written by Michelangelo Florio Crollalanza in Sicilian dialect. The play's name is
Tanto traffico per niente,
which can be translated as
Much Ado about Nothing.
He also mentions a book of sayings written by a writer, one Michelangelo Crollalanza, in sixteenth-century Calvinist northern Italy. Some of the sayings correspond to lines in
Hamlet
. Michelangelo's father, Giovanni Florio, once owned a home called ‘Casa Otello', built by a retired Venetian admiral known as Otello who, in a jealous rage, murdered his wife.

Michelangelo Florio Crollalanza decided to flee Italy because the Inquisitors had already pursued his father, and ended up in England. Contemporary Londoners even reported that Shakespeare ‘had an accent', and portraits of him show a dark man with Mediterranean appearance.

In 2008 the mayor of Sicily petitioned Prime Minister Tony Blair and Queen Elizabeth II of England to recognise Michelangelo Florio Crollalanza as the true author of Shakespeare's plays.

You might think all this an interesting idea or you might not believe a word of it. You might think both things. Maybe the story of Michelangelo Crollalanza is true. Or maybe it is just
that; a story, to add to the authorship debate, to deepen the mystery surrounding the identity of Shakespeare.

And of that, I feel sure, the real William Shakespeare, whoever he was, would have approved.

Marina Fiorato
London, 2014

Beatrice and
Benedick

A READING GROUP GUIDE

 1. 
Beatrice & Benedick
could be described as a prequel to William Shakespeare's play
Much Ado About Nothing.
If you were already familiar with the play, how did knowing the ending affect your enjoyment of the book? Have you read other books which are prequels or sequels to classic works?

 2.  How important is it that much of the book is set in Sicily? Does the island have a character of its own?

 3.  What part do Moorish characters play in the book? How does their presence define those who come into contact with them?

 4.  What does the book say about the concept of Nobility? Which characters are truly noble, and which are not?

 5.  How does Benedick's sea voyage change him?

 6.  Beatrice is an unconventional woman. How does she use her independent spirit to get what she wants? How does her conduct compare to that of Guglielma Crollalanza?

 7.  What is the significance of the religious characters in the book? How would you contrast the characters of Friar Francis and the Archbishop of Monreale?

 8.  What does the book tell us about father figures? What are the qualities or failings of Leonato Leonatus, Giovanni Florio Crollalanza, and Bartolomeo della Scala?

 9.  How does Michelangelo Crollalanza change through the course of the story?

10. Drama and public spectacle play a significant role in the book. How do the puppet show, the fencing match, the Naumachia and the Vara procession feed into the plot? Can you think of other instances in the book when the characters are playing a part?

11. Did Beatrice and Benedick's ‘merry war of wit' lose them a year of married life? Or did they need to be apart before they could be together?

12. Consider the characters of Don Pedro and Claudio. Which one do you prefer? Do either of them find redemption?

As I am of Northern Italian provenance, I was a little nervous of Sicily and ‘The South', and could not have imagined the wonderful welcome and invaluable assistance I encountered on that matchless island. I made friends for life, and, like Beatrice, I will always return.

Thank you to Katharine Dix at the exquisite Hotel Villa Angela in Taormina, who tirelessly arranged my trips to Syracuse and Messina.

Thanks also to Angelo Greco, from
The Magic of Sicily,
who took me up to the summit of Etna, and also to his cousin's farm – where my children picked oranges – and to his friend's olive press (and his other friend's bar!)

In Palermo, I must thank the Argento family, the members of which have run a jewel of a puppet theatre in the shadow of the duomo for hundreds of years. They very kindly let me poke around backstage, and even hold and operate one of the puppets, a martial fellow who was nearly as tall as me!

Also in Palermo, I am grateful to Francesca Sommatino from the University of Palermo, who spent an afternoon showing me round the Palazzo Chiaramonte, which houses the cells which the victims of the Inquisition decorated with wonderful drawings during their imprisonment.

Closer to home, I am indebted as ever to my wonderful editor Kate Parkin at Hodder, who is always there to gently nudge me back on track when I show signs of wandering off! And I owe my eternal gratitude to my agent Teresa Chris, who guides me as surely as Beatrice's star.

Also at Hodder thanks must go to Swati Gamble for getting
the final manuscript into shape, and Emilie Ferguson for spreading the word about
Beatrice & Benedick.

Of the books that I read in the course of my research one above all deserves a mention – Richard Paul Roe's
The Shakespeare Guide to Italy: Retracing the Bard's Unknown Travels
(Harper Perennial 2011) is a fascinating analysis of the geography and cultural detail of Shakespeare's Italian plays.

I have watched many wonderful performances of
Much Ado About Nothing
over the years, but the one I referred to most in the process of my writing was the Branagh/Thompson film (Kenneth Branagh 1993), which remains, for me, the definitive filmed version.

I must thank my brother-in-law Richard Brown, who knows more about seafaring than most books.

Thank you to my children; Conrad (‘
I am a gentleman, sir, and my name is Conrad
.' – Much Ado IV ii) and Ruby, who never mind being dragged around churches and palaces so long as there is a
gelato
at the end of it.

And finally I will end this book as I began it, with a dedication to Sacha. I share my
settebello
with you.

© Ian Pickard

Marina Fiorato
is half-Venetian and a history graduate of Oxford University and the University of Venice, where she specialized in the study of Shakespeare's plays as an historical source. She has worked as an illustrator, an actress, and a film reviewer, and designed tour visuals for rock bands including U2 and the Rolling Stones. Her historical fiction includes the
Venetian Bargain, The Daughter of Siena, The Botticelli Secret
, and her debut novel,
The Glassblower of Murano
, which was an international bestseller. She was married on the Grand Canal in Venice, and now lives in London with her family. You can sign up for author updates
here
.