The Bard's Mobile

Lost amidst all the hoopla and hysteria over the Murdoch phone hacking scandal in the U.K., and our own budget crisis here at home, was a fascinating story of potentially historic importance on the other side of the Atlantic, first reported last week in the Manchester Guardian.

A Shakespearean literary forensics team, led by Sir Nigel Tufnel, High Chair of the English Literature Department at the University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, digging for months at a site near Stratford-upon-Avon, have made the startling discovery of what they believe is William Shakespeare’s first cellular, or mobile, phone.

Last week a graduate student working at the site unearthed a large, wooden object, preserved in a peat bog, about the size of a shoebox.  The sole clue to the object’s identity was the letters “N-o-k-i-a” written on one side. 

While it is a widely held belief among Shakespearean scholars that the Bard himself was an early adapter of mobile phone technology, little more is known because no writings in his own hand are thought to exist.

There are notes in early Folios of Merchant of Venice, however, that indicate Shakespeare may have written Shylock’s famous line, “if you prick us, do we not bleed?” in response to seeing his first wireless bill. 

Furthermore, there are many references in some of his early comedies to “friends and family plans,” "tooths of blue" and a magical object known only as ye merry olde “Moto-rola.”

While telecommunication anthropologists have long thought there was an extremely crude, primitive wireless network in central London in Shakespeare’s time (they say it would be equivalent to today’s A.T.&T Wireless network), this is the first evidence of an Elizabethan wireless network in Warwickshire.

While the research team has not been able to power the phone (a 0G model) up - it is believed in Shakespeare’s day that a cell phone took a score of oxen working a fortnight to charge - they have been able to extract a small chip that contains a few of, what they believe may be, the great writer’s first mobile texts.

A sample of texts the team has recovered so far include:

To: BobGreene (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 2 August, 1592 (2:32 a.m.)

“A horse 2x my KD 4 a horse!”

To: CMarlowe (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 13 September, 1592 (7:45 a.m.)

“2 thine own self b tru”

To: TommyNash (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 7 October, 1592 (3:02 p.m.)

“brevity is the SOW”

To: AnneHath (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 12 November, 1592 (1:27 a.m.)

“O Romeo 2X, where 4 art thou R?”

To: BobGreene (mobile)

From: @ WS

Sent: 27 November, 1592 (7:32 p.m.)

“A2, Brute?”

To: AnneHath (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 25 December, 1592 (12:31 a.m.)

“4ever&aday”

To: CMarlowe (mobile)

From: @WS

Sent: 4 January, 1593 (2:40 p.m.)

“2 B or not 2 B – that is ?”

Prof Tufnel said, “this is a treasure trove of electronic data that will be fruit for Shakespearean scholars for generations to come.”

Wireless usage in Shakespeare’s time is thought to have been prohibitively expensive, reserved for only the highest members of society.

Tufnel noted “British Telecomm scholars believe a single text in that era may have cost as much as two pounds, three farthing, four schilling, threepence.”

“Roaming charges were, of course, bloody astronomical,” according to Tufnel.

The University of Birmingham’s team hopes to return the precious artifact to its original condition and place it on display at the Shakespeare Museum in the small village of “Stepping-on-my-Toe” in nearby Worcestershire by the end of the year, just in time to upgrade the phone, as Shakespeare’s original 420 year service agreement will finally expire.