Shakespeare's Collaborative Approach to Playwriting

The idea that Shakespeare was alone genius really started to vanish in the 19th century. Collaboration was the default model for playwriting in Shakespeare's time, many of the plays are collaborations. Then you can't have an alternative loan genius being the true author of the plays. It just doesn't wash because you're not replacing one loan genius with another. You can't do it. Actors can't keep secrets. They've never been able to. So if Shakespeare was keeping a secret, then he had to do so extremely well.