Shakespeare got by with a little help from his friends, research says

One of William Shakespeare's chief contemporaries will now be credited as one of his co-writers, thanks to an expert analysis -- one that has revealed the legendary playwright to be quite the collaborator.

Some 17 Shakespeare plays are believed to contain at least a little writing from other people, according to a recent analysis by 23 academics with Oxford University Press.

One of those co-authors is Christopher Marlowe, another playwright of the Elizabethan era occasionally rumored to be Shakespeare himself -- a possibility dismissed by most experts, who believe Shakespeare was Shakespeare.

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Marlowe's name will now appear alongside Shakespeare's for the three title pages of Henry VI — Parts One, Two and Three — in the New Oxford Shakespeare, to be published this month by Oxford University Press.

“The orthodox view was that Shakespeare didn’t collaborate at all," Gary Taylor, editor of the Oxford editions of Shakespeare's plays, told The Guardian. "When the Oxford Shakespeare in 1986 proposed that eight plays of Shakespeare contained writing by other writers, some people were outraged."

Since that time, "the accumulation of new scholarship, techniques and resources" has shown that scholars may have underestimated how much of Shakespeare’s work was collaborative, Taylor added.

Using computerized textual analysis, the Oxford researchers believe they can even tell the difference between Marlowe's writing and Shakespeare writing under Marlowe's influence.

English dramatist Christopher Marlowe is now considered a close collaborator of Shakespeare. Credit: keystone/ Getty Images

They looked at so-called "Shakespeare-plus words," like gentle, answer, beseech, spoke or tonight, which would show him to be the more likely author. Meanwhile, other evidence could show what was Marlowe's writing -- such as the phrase "glory droopeth."

Both Shakespeare and Marlowe were living in London in the early 1590s and writing for the commercial theater. Marlowe was the established genius, Shakespeare the young upstart (the three parts of Henry VI were among his earliest plays).

But even the 2016 book Shakespeare's Marlowe: The Influence of Christoper Marlowe on Shakespeare's Artistry admits there's "no evidence" the two playwrights even knew each other.

Actors from The Royal Shakespeare Company perform a rehearsal of Henry VI, now believed to have been partially written by Shakespeare rival, Christopher Marlowe. Credit: Cate Gillon/ getty Images

Along with hinting at other co-writers such as Thomas Middleton, the new research suggests that Marlowe and Shakespeare must have worked side by side.

“We have been able to verify Marlowe’s presence in those three plays strongly and clearly enough,” Taylor told The Guardian about the three parts of Henry VI.