From F G GRISLEY
Lance Fogan’s article on Shakespeare and brain function prompts me to
inquire whether a similar study has been made on the Bard’s pronouncements
astronomic (‘The neurologist of Avon’, 20 January). Consider, for instance,
Hamlet’s letter to Ophelia (Act II, Scene ii): ‘Doubt thou the stars are
fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never
doubt I love.’
The second line was written some 60 years after Copernicus’s publication
of his heliocentric theory. Did Shakespeare write in ignorance of this;
was he trying to defend a lost cause; or was he being ironic?
F. G. Grisley Barry, Glamorgan
