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Dr. Lopez and Shylock
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To the Editor:
In “Shakespeare, Shylock, and the Jews” [April], William Meyers, who has had plays produced Off Broadway and has written a new one entitled Dr. Lopez, denies Roderigo Lopez’s guilt, and simultaneously has a go at historians like myself who have tried to set the record straight. Mr. Meyers makes allusions to AIDS, Louis Farrakhan, Marion Barry, and various Americans in an attempt to understand the Lopez case through modern eyes. I have published five books on Anglo-Jewish history, and Mr. Meyers has read at least my most recent book, The Jews in the History of England, 1485-1850 (Oxford, 1994), and my chapter therein on the Lopez case. But he has chosen to ignore the overwhelming evidence demonstrating Lopez’s guilt Why?
The short answer might be that Mr. Meyers knows very little about Tudor history, and I suspect has never actually held a 400-year-old document in his hands. He apparently does not know Spanish, either, since he is unaware that the 1903 article he claims I have not read is cited in my bibliography in its original language.
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