Billy Shakespeare, Dad would say, the great genius despite his grammar-
school education, his small Latin and less Greek, was a lot of
sentimental mythology.
"You're helping perpetuate this fraud," he told Lori.
"Dad, it's just a bust," Lori said.
"That's the problem," Dad said.
He studied the sculpture, then suddenly reached over and smeared off
Shakespeare's mouth with his thumb.
"What the hell are you doing?" Lori cried out.
"It's no longer just a bust," Dad said. "Now it has symbolic value. You
can call it Mute Bard."
"I spent days on that," Lori shouted. "And you've ruined it!"
"I elevated it," Dad said. He told Lori he would help her write a paper
that would demonstrate that Shakespeare's plays had multiple authors,
like Rembrandt's paintings. "By God, you'll set the literary world on
edge," he said.
"I don't want to set the world on edge!" Lori screamed. "I just want to
win a stupid little scholarship!"
"Goddammit, you're in a horse race, but you're thinking like a sheep,"
Dad said. "Sheep don't win horse races."
Lori didn't have the spirit to rework the bust. The next day she smushed
the clay into a big glob and left it on the drafting table. I told Lori that if
she hadn't been accepted into an art school by the time she graduated,
she should go to New York anyway. She could support herself with the