Nicholas Hilliard was far and away the finest painter in England during Shakespeare’s lifetime; in some senses, he was Shakespeare’s counterpart in the fine arts. Hilliard specialized in miniature portraits of exquisite, photograph-like detail. London’s Victoria and Albert Museum owns one showing a beautiful young man set against a background of flames.
Thomas Shelton was an Anglo-Irish retainer of the Howard family and was indeed the first to translate Don Quixote into English; his translation was published in 1612. While his brother is a fiction, devout Catholic Englishmen did secretly flee to the Continent in significant numbers to attend seminaries such as the Royal College of St. Alban in Valladolid. English Jesuits were usually sent back into England to tend the Catholics there in secret.
The earliest missions in and around Santa Fe, in the area now known as New Mexico, were Franciscan. Native Americans all over the Southwest—then “New Spain” to Europeans—rose in rebellion repeatedly during the seventeenth century, massacring the Spanish invaders—especially the priests. The Dragoon Mountains of southeastern Arizona were a stronghold of the Apache until Geronimo’s final capture in 1886. (The great Apache chief Cochise lies buried in a still secret spot somewhere in these mountains.) Though I have invented the particular canyon and cavern in which Kate finds the treasure interred with bones, this part of the world is riddled with caves. The nearby (and recently discovered) Kartchner Caverns are a spectacular example of the kind of secret “jeweled palaces” the hollow mountains undoubtedly still hide.
The “signature” in the King James Bible is there for anyone to see (or count). How it came to be there has never been explained, nor have I ever discovered who “found” it. It is not known exactly when the Forty-sixth Psalm, or the Psalms as a whole, were completed (though it must have been between 1604 and 1611), or exactly who worked on which psalm. Both Lancelot Andrewes, dean of Westminster and later bishop of Chichester, and Laurence Chaderton, master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, were theologians who worked on the Bible, and the Puritan-leaning Chaderton was a member of the “First Cambridge Committee” assigned to the Psalms. The bishop’s letter about Chaderton, however, is my own imagining.
The birthdates of Bacon, Derby, and the countess of Pembroke, on the other hand, are a matter of historical record.
Transforming a daydream into a novel turns out to require a far-flung village of aid and encouragement. First and foremost, I owe thanks to Brian Tart and Mitch Hoffman, whose patience and discerning eyes helped me sculpt this book into shape. Somehow, they also kept me laughing. Neil Gordon and Erika Imranyi smoothed the process. Noah Lukeman was certain that this was the book I should be writing and worked his magic to make it happen.
For their varied expertise and input, I would also like to thank Ilana Addis, Michelle Alexander, Kathy Allen, Bill Carrell, Jamie de Courcey, Lionel Faitelson, Dave and Ellen Grounds, Father Peter Harris, Jessica Harrison, Charlotte Lowe-Bailey, Peggy Marner, Karen Melvin, Kristie Miller, Liz Ogilvy, Nick Saunders, Brian Schuyler, Dan Shapiro, Ronald Spark, Ian Tennent, and Heidi Vanderbilt. The Straw Bale Forum and the Tucson Literary Club heard early versions of some pages, and for my involvement in both these groups I am indebted to Bazy Tankersley.
Special thanks to Dr. Javier Burrieza Sánchez, librarian and archivist at the Royal College of St. Alban, Valladolid; to Nigel Bailey, house manager, and Carol Kitching, head guide, at Wilton House, Wiltshire; and to Sarah Weatherall at Shakespeare’s Globe, London. The staffs at the Folger Library in Washington, D.C., and Holy Trinity Church and the Shakespeare Centre Library, both in Stratford, were also most helpful.
More than anyone else, Marge Garber has shaped the way I think about Shakespeare on the page. The members of Harvard’s Hyperion Theatre Company, 1996–98, and Shakespeare & Company, based in Lenox, Massachusetts, taught me what I know about Shakespeare on the stage. David Ira Goldstein and the Arizona Theatre Company have welcomed me into the world of professional theater as a frequent guest.
Three people listened, read, and commented endlessly as this book took shape: Kristen Poole, scholar, storyteller, and friend; my mother, Melinda Carrell, who first taught me to love books; and my husband, Johnny Helenbolt.
My debt to Johnny remains boundless.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JENNIFER LEE CARRELL holds her Ph.D. in English and American literature from Harvard University, as well as other degrees in English literature from Oxford and Stanford universities. She won three awards for distinction in undergraduate teaching at Harvard University, where she taught in the History and Literature Program and directed Shakespeare for the Hyperion Theatre Company. Jennifer is the author of The Speckled Monster, a work of historical nonfiction about battling smallpox in the beginning of the eighteenth century, which USA Today cited as being written “in a compelling, almost novelistic, voice.” She has also written a number of articles for Smithsonian Magazine. Interred with Their Bones is her first novel.
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