In December 1794, a young man in London named William Henry Ireland brought his father, Samuel, a devoted collector of antiquities and curiosities, a parchment document sealed with wax. After carefully opening up the parchment, Samuel was astonished at what he saw: a mortgage deed dated 1610, signed by William Shakespeare and John Heminges, an actor in Shakespeare’s King’s Men troupe of players.

At the time, only a handful of signatures were known to have survived from Shakespeare’s handwritten records, so to have a personal document like this was an extraordinary coup. William Henry explained that the document was one of dozens like it he had found while rummaging in an old chest belonging to a rich gentleman whom William Henry described only as “Mr. H.” The gentleman wished to remain anonymous to avoid being bothered, William Henry explained, but had assured the young man that he had little interest in the documents and could take whatever he liked.

Eager to figure out whether the documents were real, Samuel Ireland contacted the College of Heralds (an organization devoted to coats of arms and genealogical research), who determined that the documents were genuine, although they were unable to identify the image on the Shakespearean wax seal. Fortunately, Samuel’s young assistant Frederick Eden was an authority on seals, and he decided that the impression on the seal looked like a quintain—a revolving target used by knights in jousting practice. A tenuous association with actual “shaking spears” was all Samuel needed: These documents must indeed be Shakespeare’s own, he decided, and he promptly put them on display in his curio-filled home on London’s Norfolk Street. Before long, A-list literary types were queuing up to take a look—and still young William Henry continued to unearth ever more impressive examples.

 
At a time when interest in Shakespeare’s work was at the highest it had been since his death almost two centuries earlier, the Irelands had seemingly unearthed a gold mine of Shakespearean memorabilia. Handwritten IOUs, love letters to his future wife “Anna Hatherrewaye,” signed actors’ contracts, theatrical receipts, and even a bizarrely cartoonish self-portrait all found their way out of William Henry’s seemingly boundless document chest and into his father’s display. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. Books from Shakespeare’s library with his own annotations in the margins also soon emerged, as did a first draft of King Lear hand-prepared by Shakespeare, and perhaps most significant of all of the Irelands’ discoveries, an entirely new play, Vortigern and Rowena.

The literary world was suitably shaken up. Although never a fan of Shakespeare (and despite saying he thought its script was “crude and undigested”) Irish playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan was impressed enough to acquire the performance rights to Vortigern and Rowena, which he planned to stage at his newly expanded Drury Lane, then the largest theater in London. Even more impressed was James Boswell, biographer of lexicographer and noted Shakespeare fanatic Samuel Johnson. Aging and in poor health, Boswell arrived at the Irelands’ Norfolk Street home and was ushered into Samuel Ireland’s study. A glass of warmed brandy in one hand and the documents in another, he went through the pages one by one, holding them up to a light to examine their penmanship in more detail. After several hours’ analysis, he lowered himself onto one knee and kissed the collection of pages before him. “I shall now died contented,” he reportedly said, “since I have lived to see the present day.” Three months later, he was dead [PDF].

On Christmas Eve 1795, about a year after the first documents came to light, Samuel Ireland published Miscellaneous Papers and Legal Instruments Under the Hand and Seal of William Shakespeare—a lavish anthology of all the papers in his collection, featuring facsimiles and reprints of the pages. The book was a success, but its popularity brought the Irelands’ discoveries under more widespread scrutiny.

While some experts of the day had been keen to authenticate the documents, over time the inconsistent handwriting and poor-quality prose began to raise suspicion. In March 1796, the foremost Shakespeare authority of the era, Edmond Malone, published An Inquiry Into the Authenticity of Certain Miscellaneous Papers and Legal Instruments—a detailed analysis arguing that the documents were nothing but a “clumsy and daring fraud.” Even still, opinion was divided; Malone’s book was long and scholarly, and not everyone had the patience to sort through its arguments, damning as they were.

 
In April 1796, Sheridan staged the performance of Vortigern and Rowena at Drury Lane theater. But trouble was brewing: although the first few acts were received enthusiastically, the writing went drastically downhill, and several skeptical actors overplayed their lines for effect. One, John Philip Kemble, the era’s leading theater performer, stole the show in the final act by pronouncing the line “and when this solemn mockery is ended” in a rumbling, drawn-out, overly dramatic voice, prompting minutes of laughter and whistling from the audience. When the curtain came down, the audience erupted into both applause and booing, and a fight erupted in the pit between those who believed the work was genuine, and those who did not.

London was divided. On the one hand, Malone and his supporters saw the Irelands’ collection as an elaborate and heartless deception. On the other, there were those who steadfastly wanted to believe that they were authentic, and that a true goldmine of Shakespeare’s lost works had been uncovered. Boswell and other diehard believers, including Poet Laureate Henry Pye, had even drawn up a “Certificate of Belief” stating that they “entertained no doubt whatsoever as to the validity of the Shakespearean production.” The latter camp, however, was about to be bitterly disappointed. Late in 1796 William Henry Ireland published An Authentic Account of the Shaksperian Manuscripts—in which he confessed that the entire collection were forged.

Knowing that his father was an obsessive collector of Shakespearean memorabilia, William Henry had staged the very first document—the mortgage deed—by copying Shakespeare’s signature from a facsimile printed in an edition of his plays. Doctoring the ink made the writing look aged. Blank pages were torn from old books as a cheap supply of old paper, and scorching the papers with a candle gave them a convincing brown tinge.

As time went by and Samuel’s collection began to gain prominence, William Henry grew bolder in his forgeries. Extracts from Shakespeare’s plays were rewritten with spellings tweaked and lines reworked, sometimes with entirely new sections added. The love letter to Anne Hathaway was made up entirely—as was the entire script of Vortigern and Rowena. No wonder Sheridan had found the text so badly written; it appeared to have been written by a 19-year-old.

Even after his son declared the whole thing a hoax, Samuel Ireland refused to believe the works were forgeries. He went to his death in 1800 believing his son incapable of such an elaborate fraud, and committed to the idea that the works were genuine. William Henry, meanwhile, found it hard to get work once his deceit was uncovered: After a time in debtor’s prison, he moved to France, where he wrote books about French history and culture. He also published his own edition of Vortigern in 1832 and a series of gothic novels, but still struggled to make ends meet, and died in poverty in 1835.

Nowadays, William Henry is viewed more sympathetically: his father, it has emerged, was cold and distant in his childhood, caring more for his precious collection than for his young family. Although naïve in producing his forgeries, William Henry was seemingly only trying to foster some common ground with his father—and the more he brought him, the better the two got on. Alienating themselves from the literary community, it appeared, was just an unwelcome consequence. No matter how he and his work are viewed, however, William Henry Ireland’s great Shakespeare hoax remains an extraordinarily audacious—and, for a time, extraordinarily successful—literary deception.

Presidential possessions have always commanded attention and high prices at auction, but few former leaders have held the interest of collectors more than John F. Kennedy. In 2013, his leather bomber jacket sold for $570,000 and an 18 karat ring fetched $90,000. The latest in Kennedy artifacts expected to command a premium didn’t disappoint.

On April 26, a 61-page diary kept when Kennedy was a journalist stationed in Europe for the Hearst newspaper company in 1945 sold for $718,750, far exceeding Boston-based RR Auction’s $200,000 estimate. The writings—mostly typed, with 12 pages of handwritten materials—contain Kennedy’s thoughts on the Soviet Union, musings on the aftermath of Adolf Hitler’s reign of destruction, and passages on the United Nations.

In a glimpse of the contents provided by ABC News, Kennedy, who was 28 years old at the time, took an intriguing position on the German dictator, writing that “he had in him the stuff of which legends are made” and that “within a few years Hitler will emerge from the hatred that surrounds him now as one of the most significant figures who ever lived.”

The diary was later given by Kennedy to one of his campaign workers in 1959. The assistant, Deirdre Henderson, told NPR that she had largely ignored the document due to the time constraints of supporting Kennedy’s presidential bid. The writings were eventually published under the title Prelude to Leadership in 1995.

[h/t Associated Press]

The next time you see a neon sign, appreciate the science and skill it took to create it.

The American Shakespeare Center wants to see your fan fiction. As Vox reports, the theater company in Staunton, Virginia is in search of “companion pieces” that tell stories that are about, inspired by, or otherwise involve the Bard and his work. And they’re paying.

Jim Warren, the center’s artistic director, is looking for plays that “vibe off Shakespeare,” as he explains in a press release. This is how he describes what they’re looking for:

We’re not looking for a retelling of Shakespeare plays. We’re looking for partner plays that are inspired by Shakespeare, plays that might be sequels or prequels to Shakespeare’s stories, plays that might tell the stories of minor characters in Shakespeare’s stories, plays that might dramatize Shakespeare’s company creating the first production of a title, plays that might include modern characters interacting with Shakespeare’s characters, plays that will be even more remarkable when staged in rotating repertory with their Shakespeare counterpart and actors playing the same characters who might appear in both plays, plays that not only will appeal to other Shakespeare theater, but also to all types of theater and audiences around the world.

For the next two decades, the American Shakespeare Center plans to select two such plays every year, rewarding the chosen playwrights with $25,000 each, as well as travel and housing expenses to come to Staunton for rehearsals. Each year, there will be a call for plays inspired by a few specific works in Shakespeare’s oeuvre—this year, The Merry Wives of Windsor; Henry IV, Part 1; The Comedy of Errors; and The Winter’s Tale are on the docket.

The idea is that the new plays will complement the traditional pieces the theater plans to put on during the year. Playwrights will need to take into account that their work will be performed at the American Shakespeare Center in Virginia, which is a recreation of the type of theater that housed Shakespeare’s original performances—no fancy sets or lighting, using a small set of actors who play multiple parts and might need to cross-dress at some point. Basically, they’re looking for your rendition of Shakespeare in Love.

You have until February 2018 to submit.

[h/t Vox]

Researchers writing in the journal Science Advances say blue mussels are rapidly evolving stronger shells to protect themselves against rising acid levels in sea water.

Bivalves like mussels, clams, and oysters aren’t good swimmers, and they don’t have teeth. Their hard shells are often the only things standing between themselves and a sea of dangers.

But even those shells have been threatened lately, as pollution and climate change push the ocean’s carbon dioxide to dangerous levels. Too much carbon dioxide interferes with a bivalve’s ability to calcify (or harden) its shell, leaving it completely vulnerable.

A team of German scientists wondered what, if anything, the bivalves were doing to cope. They studied two populations of blue mussels (Mytilus edulis): one in the Baltic Sea, and another in the brackish waters of the North Sea.

The researchers collected water samples and monitored the mussel colonies for three years. They analyzed the chemical content of the water and the mussels’ life cycles—tracking their growth, survival, and death.

Analysis of all that data showed that the two groups were living very different lives. The Baltic was rapidly acidifying—but rather than rolling over and dying, Baltic mussels were armoring up. Over several generations, their shells grew harder.

Their cousins living in the relatively stable waters of the North Sea enjoyed a cushier existence. Their shells stayed pretty much the same. That may be the case for now, the researchers say, but it definitely leaves them vulnerable to higher carbon dioxide levels in the future.

Inspiring as the Baltic mussels’ defiance might be, the researchers note that it’s not a short-term solution. Tougher shells didn’t increase the mussels’ survival rate in acidified waters—at least, not yet.

“Future experiments need to be performed over multiple generations,” the authors write, “to obtain a detailed understanding of the rate of adaptation and the underlying mechanisms to predict whether adaptation will enable marine organisms to overcome the constraints of ocean acidification.”

When astronauts finally make it to Mars, they’ll need something to eat. And while NASA is working on shelf-stable rations for those eventual missions, astronauts will ideally be able to grow their own plants while exploring other worlds. That’s where the University of Arizona’s inflatable greenhouse comes in, designboom reports.

The University of Arizona’s Controlled Environment Agriculture Center is helping the space agency develop a closed-loop system that can provide astronauts with food, clean the air, and recycle waste and water in alien environments. This “bioregenerative life support system” uses plants and LEDs to recreate what’s essentially a miniature Earth environment, according to designboom.

The Lunar Greenhouse prototype is an 18-foot-long, 7-foot-wide cylinder that is designed to take the carbon dioxide that astronauts breathe out and turn it into oxygen through plant photosynthesis. Astronauts would introduce water into the system either from supplies they bring with them or that they find after they arrive, if possible. That water is then run through the cylinder, flowing along the plants’ roots and back into the greenhouse storage system.

The scientists and engineers at the University of Arizona and NASA’s Kennedy Advanced Life Support Research project are currently trying to figure out what seeds, plants, and equipment will be necessary to make the system work on the moon or Mars. It may need to be buried underground to prevent radiation damage, hence the LEDs, but in certain environments, it may be able to work with just sunlight.

Scientists have already been working on growing plants beyond Earth’s atmosphere without a dedicated greenhouse. Several kinds of plants, including vegetables and flowers, have been grown on the International Space Station. But for longer-term exploration of other worlds, we’ll need something more permanent than a space station.

“The greenhouses provide a more autonomous approach to long-term exploration on the moon, Mars and beyond,” the Kennedy Space Center’s Ray Wheeler said in a press release. It would, of course, be a lot easier to travel to Mars with a bunch of seeds than to bring along years’ worth of food and air purification equipment.

[h/t designboom]

The solution to most of our money problems is pretty simple: more money. But a larger income doesn’t guarantee a lifetime of financial solvency. For many folks who can’t break free from a paycheck-to-paycheck cycle, lifestyle inflation is to blame.

Lifestyle inflation happens when your spending increases as your income increases. You get a raise at work, so you move to a bigger apartment. You start earning extra cash on the side, and you spend it on small expenses (a new manicure habit, or a subscription to HBO) that add up over time. That’s the thing with lifestyle inflation—it often goes unnoticed.

The problem, of course, is that you gradually lose control of your finances. “Lifestyle inflation is different than a one-time splurge,” says Jackie Lam of the website Cheapsters.org. “It increases your living expenses over the long run. The problem with lifestyle inflation is that even though you have more money, you won’t be saving any more of it. Sometimes you may find yourself in even more debt.”

If your lifestyle spending has gotten out of control, here are a few ways to break the cycle.

1. TRACK YOUR SPENDING.

When you’re ready to deflate your lifestyle, the first step is to look at the numbers. Pull your monthly statements and carefully review your transactions so you can identify any spending problem areas. You might be surprised to find just how much those small lunches or Amazon purchases add up. Once you know where your weak spots are, you can prioritize and rethink how you allocate your money.

“I’m a fan of the Marie Kondo method of decluttering, and you can do the same with your expenses,” Lam says. “Is what you’re spending on bringing you joy? Do you have space for it in your budget?”

Love your daily latte but know you’re spending way too much money on coffee? Lam recommends you find a more affordable alternative. “I’m a huge fan of the ‘swap it, don’t stop it’ method,” she says. “Figure out what the value of something is and see if you can find alternatives. For instance, if you go to CrossFit class partly for the camaraderie, are there other ways you can get fit and hang out with people and spend less?”

2. THINK OF BUDGETING AS A HABIT, NOT A TASK.

Most people have the wrong idea about budgeting. We think of it as a one-time task: crunch the numbers, come up with a spending plan and boom, we’re done budgeting.

But budgeting is more of a habit: It’s most effective when you make it a regular activity. Pick a time to check in on your spending and make sure everything’s on track. Maybe it’s in the morning, when you sit down with your coffee, or at the end of the day, when you get home. Maybe it makes the most sense for you to keep a journal and write down all the stuff you spend money on throughout the day. Whatever ritual you choose, when you make budgeting a part of your routine, you keep your spending goals front-of-mind. Plus, if there are any problems, you can nip them in the bud before they get out of hand.

3. MAKE SMALL ADJUSTMENTS.

Once you’ve identified the areas you want to cut back on, it’s time to test your willpower. To make things easier on yourself, focus on one area at a time. When you try to cut back on everything all at once, the result is an entirely different lifestyle—one that may be too jarringly different to maintain.

If you want to roll back your spending on clothing, restaurants, and gadgets, for example, challenge yourself to first cut back on eating out for 60 days. Once you’ve got your restaurant habit under control, move on to clothing (or gadgets, but not both).

You can also take smaller steps within each challenge. If you ultimately want to spend $100 less on restaurants every week, start with a stepping-stone goal of spending $50 less. The next week, increase your savings to $75, and so on until your reach your restaurant spending goal.

“If someone has multiple problem areas, I suggest going for the easy wins first,” Lam suggests. “Try to cut out what may cost the most but offer you the least joy. Eventually you might have to cut out something that you really enjoy,” but when this time comes, you will already know how good it feels to meet your goals.

4. AUTOMATICALLY SAVE YOUR RAISES.

The most straightforward way to combat lifestyle inflation is to make sure it doesn’t happen in the first place. Again, lifestyle inflation happens when you increase your spending along with your income. So when your income increases, resist the urge to “upgrade” your life, and instead put that additional income aside. For example, when you get a raise, increase your debt payments or your savings deposits.

Of course, it’s okay to celebrate, too. There’s certainly nothing wrong with spending your hard-earned money, you just want to be mindful about it. “Go on a reasonable splurge,” Lam says. “For instance, if you just got a raise or bonus, have a little bit of fun with it, and save the rest. You earned it, after all.”

Putting a spending limit on the splurge ensures you can keep it under control. As Lam says, it serves as a guideline and prevents you from blowing it all.

5. USE WINDFALLS TO PAY DOWN DEBT.

Similarly, when an unexpected amount of money comes your way, use it for good. Instead of squandering your entire tax refund or work bonus on sundries, put it towards debt or a financial goal. If you’re stuck in a debt trap or a paycheck-to-paycheck cycle, this is a quick way to supercharge your goal.

Money is a tool that’s meant to be spent, and there’s nothing wrong with spending it on things you enjoy. But it’s also a limited resource for most of us, so you want to make sure you use it in the best way possible.

“If you find yourself with more money, think about the few things that can really add value in your life,” Lam says. “I’d say add things in carefully and gradually. Give yourself a one-month trial to see how it goes. Be the CFO of your budget, and make sure what you spend your beans on (besides bills) has purpose or value.”

Every unwanted promotion/newsletter/coupon that shows up in your inbox is a reminder that you should really get your unread messages under control. But after ending up on dozens of useless mailing lists over the years, it can be hard to know where to start. The creators of Astro understand you’re overwhelmed, and they’ve programmed an algorithm to help.

As Fast Company reports, the new app uses artificial intelligence to anticipate how you’ll respond to the messages flooding your email. If there’s someone you correspond with regularly, for example, Astro will notice and automatically prioritize their emails. If you suddenly stop responding to an email chain, Astro will send you a reminder in a chat bot window, highlighting any questions that went unanswered.

The chat feature works both ways. If you want to unsubscribe from an email list, or learn more about an address you don’t recognize, you can ask Astro for help by sending it a message. Sometimes sending directions isn’t necessary: After analyzing your behavior, Astro will prompt you to delete messages, unsubscribe from emails, and archive chains that are likely irrelevant.

Astro offers the same features as most email organization apps—folders, scheduling, notifications, mute, and snooze buttons—but it’s the AI component that sets it apart. After rolling out in beta for Mac and iOS, the app debuted on Android on Tuesday, April 25. Compatibility with Amazon’s Alexa assistant is also in the works.

Holders of a Gmail or Office 365 account can sign up to try out the beta app today. If you’re still not mentally prepared to clear out your inbox, even with an AI helper, there are a few shortcuts you can take to reach Inbox Zero. Here’s a step-by-step guide to marking all your messages as read in Gmail.

[h/t Fast Company]

Bad airplane food is a cliché for a reason, but Air New Zealand is bucking the trend, Food & Wine reports. The airline’s new in-flight menus feature culinary creations by New Zealand chef Michael Meredith and Peter Gordon, the Kiwi-born executive chef of London’s popular The Providores and Tapa Room. To promote their revamped meal options, Air New Zealand launched a free, two-day pop-up restaurant in London that serves nothing but airplane food.

The temporary outpost, called This is How We Fly, is running out of the Unit London gallery in Soho, but it’s only sticking around for two days—April 25 and April 26 (which is today, which means you’ve only got a few hours left to give it a try). Patrons sit in airplane chairs and dine on options including “lamb with minted peas, braised lettuce with bacon lardons, and salt roasted crushed new potatoes with mint jelly” and a “yoghurt marinated chicken tikka with saffron pilaf jewelled rice, and aloo ghobi with spicy raita dressing,” according to Food & Wine.

This pop-up restaurant only serves airplane food—and weirdly, it’s really good: https://t.co/PWDaPDcHGM pic.twitter.com/kAk35QwEVN

— Food & Wine (@foodandwine) April 26, 2017

Vegetarians were able to indulge, too, as the airline’s meatless dishes included “soy marinated tofu brown rice seaweed with sesame miso dressing and a chunky vegetable” and “tofu coconut curry with spinach and coriander green rice.” New Zealand wines and desserts like apple rhubarb and treacle tarts, were also on the menu.

Air New Zealand didn’t simply wine and dine prospective flyers, they also surveyed them on their attitudes about airline food. The company questioned 1000 adults, and found that 25 percent of respondents preferred hospital menu options to airline cuisine. Meanwhile, half of respondents said they disliked airplane food. Still, customers were willing to reconsider their relationship with sky grub if it were made from fresher ingredients, or if menus featured a wider array of options.

Air New Zealand isn’t the only company in the South Pacific that’s rethinking its approach to airplane food: Airlines flying out of the state of Queensland, Australia, have teamed up with a charity called OzHarvest Brisbane to collect uneaten sandwiches and snacks, which are then donated to more than 800 charities.

[h/t Food & Wine]

In May, Star Wars: A New Hope celebrates the big 4-0. The iconic film was released on May 25, 1977, and fans around the world are marking the milestone with special screenings, sweepstakes, and limited-edition merchandise. But the most over-the-top anniversary homage to George Lucas’s space opera may belong to Tanaka Kikinzoku Jewelry, a fine jewelry retailer in Japan. Mashable reports that the company has created a solid 24-karat-gold sculpture of Darth Vader’s mask, priced at $1.4 million.

The 33-pound gold mask is currently on display at Tanaka Kikinzoku’s flagship store in Tokyo. Star Wars fans with cash to spare can purchase it on May 4, known among fans as “Star Wars Day.” (It’s rooted in the pun “May the fourth be with you.”)

This isn’t Tanaka Kikinzoku’s first pricey pop-culture homage, and it likely won’t be their last: In past years, the company has made headlines for creating a gold cast of soccer player Lionel Messi’s left foot and a pure gold replica of a Gundam robot.

Can’t afford Tanaka Kikinzoku’s latest? Japan Times reports that the company is also selling 77 Star Wars-themed commemorative plaques, adorned with three pure gold coins for $11,000. The coins are emblazoned with Star Wars-inspired designs and the number “1977525,” or May 25, 1977.

[h/t Mashable]