General introduction / Paul Edmondson and Stanley Wells
Part I. Sceptics: 1. The unreadable Delia Bacon / Graham Holderness; 2. The case for Bacon / Alan Stewart; 3. The case for Marlowe / Charles Nicholl; 4. The life and theatrical interests of Edward de Vere, seventeenth Earl of Oxford / Alan H. Nelson; 5. The unusual suspects / Matt Kubus
Part II. Shakespeare as Author: 6. Theorizing Shakespeare's authorship / Andrew Hadfield; 7. Allusions to Shakespeare to 1642 / Stanley Wells; 8. Shakespeare as collaborator / John Jowett; 9. Authorship and the evidence of stylometrics / MacDonald P. Jackson; 10. What does textual evidence reveal about the author? / James Mardock and Eric Rasmussen; 11. Shakespeare and Warwickshire / David Kathman; 12. Shakespeare and school / Carol Rutter; 13. Shakespeare tells lies / Barbara Everett
Part III. A Cultural Phenomenon: Did Shakespeare Write Shakespeare?: 14. 'This palpable device': authorship and conspiracy in Shakespeare's life / Kathleen E. McLuskie; 15. Amateurs and professionals: regendering Bacon / Andrew Murphy; 16. Fictional treatments of Shakespeare's authorship / Paul Franssen; 17. The 'declaration of reasonable doubt' / Stuart Hampton-Reeves; 18. 'There won't be puppets, will there?': 'Heroic' authorship and the cultural politics of Anonymous / Douglas M. Lanier; 19. 'The Shakespeare establishment' and the Shakespeare authorship discussion / Paul Edmondson
Afterword / James Shapiro
A selected reading list / Hardy Cook.