Or maybe I'm being hypothetically unfair...?

The Epistle Dedicatory to the First Folio (1623) states this about the Author:

"...he not having the fate, common with some, to be exequutor to his owne writings..."

How did "fate" prevent the Stratford Shakspere, assuming he was the author, from being executor to his work?

(Said Epistle dedicated the Folio to the Herbert brothers, one of whom was married to the daughter of ... Edward De Vere.)

One point I readily admit is that it is exceedingly hard to get any sort of a fix on Shakespeare as a flesh and blood individual, seperate from his art.  Even after reading a bit into his life, I have no real sense of what his character was like.  He was either a very private person or we've just lost too much evidence about him to say much with certainty, or both. That's disappointing given how glorious his work was.  Ever since he came to be crowned as the great genius of our language's literature in the eighteenth century, our lack of knowledge about his personality, combined with the banal, bourgeois nature of what we do know about him seems to have created a nigh irresitable temptation to fill in the gaps with fancy-- whether that involves going beyond the evidence in musing on Shakespeare's life or finding some sort of racier, more satisfying substitute to propose as the author in his stead.

Despite what Price writes, however, I don't think some of the gaps in his record are all that unusual. The one thing that does seem to have been unique about Shakespeare is that he worked his entire career for one theater troupe rather than as a freelancer, as was more typical for a playwright of the era.  That too woud have eliminated a great deal of the paper trail- as a shareholder in the Chamberlain's/King's Men would he really be meticulously documenting how much money he payed himself to write plays for his own company to be played by him and his friends as actors?  Beyond that, and the few reminiscences we have about the man from people like Greene, Digges, Hemings, Condell, and Jonson, there is silence.  But it's not a silence that strikes me as sinister or suspicious.  Unsatisfying, perhaps, but far from sufficient in my mind to raise serious doubts about his authorship, let alone enough to disqualify Shakespeare from his perch.

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I'm not a historian of the period, so I can't fairly say I have legitimate expectations. I might just be a disgruntled fool! But what I think would be central to establishing Shakspere as Shakespeare would be any documents about his actual creative process.

When did he write any of the works. Not when were they published or began to appear or be staged etc. Some document that could begin to describe any dates for any work specifically tied to Shakspere himself.

Where did he write any of the works. Not assumptions about Shakspere's primary locales being Stratford and London and therefore somewhere thereabouts. Some document that could begin to describe any places for any work specifically tied to Shakspere himself.

Why did he write any of the works. Not assumptions based on events that occurred during a speculative chronology. Some document that could begin to describe how whatever Shakspere himself was doing at whatever place and at whatever time had any direct or even indirect link to any of the works.

How did he write any of the works. Not assumptions based on the works themselves and on that basis speculating that Shakspere must have known such and such and done such and such. Some document that shows his background, his training, his education, his erudition, his habits, his customs, his process, etc. Just any one document that tells us any one thing about Shakspere himself working as the author.

Maybe this seems like asking for the moon, but of all these categories and of all the myriad of possible, conceivable documents that just might have survived, not a single one of them has. I mean, not even a single solitary scrap! Nothing! Meanwhile, we have a plethora of documents about Shakspere's activities, both business-related and even highly personal, all that has survived, and yet not a whisper about the when, where, why, and how of his being the author. So, this is as the Oxfordians assert: everything about Shakspere the man tells us NOTHING about Shakespeare the author.

(I could say "almost" not a whisper because, as I've noted before, I'm still not convinced that the "shake-scene" attack was not against Shakspere and it seems to me that it was more than his being merely a presumptuous actor since he is attacked through a pun on an early Shakespeare play. But I would not be close-minded about this if an Oxfordian text is out there to convince me otherwise. Perhaps the Ogburn that I haven't gotten to?)

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...unique about Shakespeare is that he worked his entire career for one theater troupe rather than as a freelancer, as was more typical for a playwright of the era.  That too woud have eliminated a great deal of the paper trail-...

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To say he "worked" for just one troupe is not to say that the record shows he was the exclusive playwright for that same troupe. Oxfordians would want this point to be made explicitly clear. Shakspere may have been directly associated with one troupe at a time but nothing anywhere states that this association was as playwright.

Doug, it's nice conversing with you. I'm not any clearer myself on the subject, but probably that's a good thing. Just a sign I need to learn more, which is always exciting.