ABSTRACT
The Queen’s Men, Strange’s Men, Pembroke’s Men, and Sussex’s Men arguably
constitute the four most prominent candidates for Shakespeare’s early company
membership, while the Lancashire argument, with or without Hoghton’s and
Hesketh’s Men, represents one of the currently popular theories about Shakespeare’s
pre-1594 whereabouts. Over the course of the last two centuries, however, a half-
dozen other companies have been proposed as Shakespeare’s first (or at least early)
company. Of these troupes, Leicester’s Men has historically attracted the most
attention from scholars, who have pointed to several different areas of evidence
in support of Shakespeare’s membership in that company. Various arguments for
other companies, most of which have found few advocates and thus remained on the
fringes of Shakespeare scholarship, utilize similar kinds of evidence or logic-and
exhibit the same sorts of weaknesses-found in arguments for Leicester’s Men. This
final chapter, then, will first examine the argument for Shakespeare’s presence in
Leicester’s Men, followed by brief considerations of arguments for Shakespeare’s
membership in Essex’s, Worcester’s, Warwick’s, Oxford’s, and the Admiral’s Men.
Leicester’s Men and Shakespeare
