A team of literary scholars has reignited controversy surrounding one of English literature’s most renowned insults—”upstart crow”—long believed to be a jealous jibe at William Shakespeare by fellow playwright Robert Greene. But new research published in Shakespeare Quarterly now suggests that the true author of the phrase was actually Thomas Nashe, a colleague and potential collaborator of Shakespeare’s.
The insult first appeared in the 1592 pamphlet Greene’s Groatsworth of Wit, published a short time after Greene’s death. It criticized an “upstart crow beautified with our feathers,” commonly interpreted as a slight against Shakespeare, an actor-turned-playwright without a university education. The passage accuses him of intruding into literary territory claimed by the more formally educated “university wits,” a group that included Greene, Nashe, George Peele, and Christopher Marlowe.
Despite Groatsworth being traditionally ascribed to Greene, the recent study by Professor Brett Greatley-Hirsch (University of Leeds), Professor Andrew Hadfield (University of Sussex), and Dr. Rachel White (Durham University) presents compelling textual and computational evidence that Nashe is very possibly the author of the infamous lines.
The researchers used literary analysis and machine learning methods—including Delta analysis, Support Vector Machines, and Zeta methods—to compare linguistic patterns in Groatsworth with those in known works by Greene, Nashe, and Henry Chettle, Greene’s literary executor. Their results consistently pointed to Nashe as the likely author of the letter containing the “upstart crow” passage, with Chettle appearing to have compiled or edited other parts.
The finding gives quantitative backing to a pre-existing hypothesis by Shakespearean scholar Professor Katherine Duncan-Jones, who had already speculated that the tone of the controversial passage matched the writing style of Nashe.
But if Nashe wrote the insult, why would he target Shakespeare, especially since they may have collaborated on Henry VI, Part One? Specialists remain divided.
Curiously, Nashe denied authorship publicly at the time, claiming that “not the least word or syllable … proceeded from my pen.” Similarly, Chettle claimed the pamphlet was all Greene’s. However, scholars now suggest these denials may have been disingenuous.
The research not only complicates the narrative of Shakespeare’s early career and supposed rivalries but also challenges assumptions about Renaissance literary authorship. If Nashe is the author of the insult, it adds an ironic twist: the slight may have come from a friend and sometime collaborator, instead of a bitter rival.
Objective research suggests the insult wasn’t even directed at Shakespeare, but at the prominent actor Edward Alleyn. The wording fits much better with him.