I just don't see how the preceding paragraphs lead to the penultimate one. I'm not a Sidney scholar, but it seems to me that the whole of Mary Sidney's life of letters up to that point is fascinating and generally accepted with occasional disagreements over print shop gossip. On the other hand, the notion that Mary took the unprecedented step of assuming the pen name of Shakespeare (who later turns up as a real person who apparently decided to assume that name as well) in order to write a riposte to all those back stage Tommy's in the figure of Venus and Adonis, well, that seems a bit of a stretch to me. Especially when the similarity to Hero and Leander is considered. Mary got her name into print well before 1593, so no real reason why she couldn't address the matter in person. I do not accept the notion that stooping to humble Nashe, Daniel, Greville or Florio would have been so beneath her that the Shakespeare ruse was necessary or even useful. I'd like to see some more support of the need for or utility of this disguise if it's available. Similarly, I continue to find a substantial disconnect between the known work of Lady Pembroke and the poem Venus and Adonis. Meanwhile, what have you to say about Harvey's allegation in L'Envoy, the tag to his Gorgon, or That Wonderful Yeare, that "The hugest miracle remains behind / The second Shakerley Rash-Swath to bind"?
As for the "substantial disconnect" between Mary's known work and Venus and Adonis, you will have to clarify for me to answer. Assuming Doleful Lay is correctly attributed by Spenser, she had already written a memorial for her brother in the same verse form. Fraunce establishes that she encouraged Ovidian stories of transformation in his honor, it is hardly a stretch to suggest she might have written one herself. Arefin et all (2014) places Mary's Psalms among the closest works to Venus and Adonis based on word usage despite the difference in genre (see here: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0111445)
Harvey suggests that the miracle or singularity which he associates with his Gentlewoman would have happened in 1588 but was delayed until 1593. Mary spent two years in seclusion at Wilton after her brother's death before triumphantly rejoining the court in 1588 as part of the coronation day procession celebrating the defeat of the Armada. Harvey may mean that she intended to publish her writing then but deferred because of the Armada, he suggest she will be recognized after the publication of V&A in 1593. An alternative reading concerns Harvey's brother Richard's prediction of a cataclysm based on astronomical alignment (something Nashe ridicules elsewhere). In any event I don't see how Harvey could be referring to Marlowe in light of the disparaging remarks you make in your next comment.
I think I mostly answered this in the comment on the previous post. The whole of Mary's life of letters up to this point constitutes the published translations of Antonie and Mornay, her Psalms, a couple short masques or dialogues attached to a presentation version of the Psalms apparently intended for the Queen (and possibly performed at some point), a translation of Petrarch's Triumph of Death which survived in second hand manuscript and a pair of memorial poems for her brother "to the Angel Spirit" and "the Doleful Lay of Clorinda" attached to Spenser's Colin Clout Comes Home Again. Nearly all of this work appears to have been completed in the years immediately following her brother's death, before Mary turned 30. There is no evidence that her interest in writing stopped at that time and her biographers note references to a substantial body of work beyond the ones listed which is somehow lost.
At least my reading of Harvey constitutes fairly direct testimony that Mary was the author of the Gentlewoman Poems which attacked Nashe, and I believe the textual links to Nashe's dedication to Astrophel and multiple references to Mary as Pallas and her spear constitute a compelling reason why the name William Shakespeare would immediately suggest her role in the work. With respect to an actual person name William Shakespeare (or Shakspere) the easiest explanation was that the man from Stratford was an actor associated with the company which suggested the name (or he was in fact the writer of the canon writing on behalf of Mary). I do not believe either of these are likely given the absence of evidence of such an actor or of connection to Stratford. I believe that the references to Shakespeare connected to the company are all to the pseudonymous writer who is most likely Mary and the connection to Stratford was made only after Shakspere's death by insertion in his will and placing the monument after the Folio was published. I don't understand your notion that "he turns up as a real person" if by that you mean as I think you suggested in your previous comment that he joined after the publication of Venus and Adonis as some sort of business manager.
My reading of Hero and Leander is that Marlowe acknowledges that as a distinct work by a different author, also in honor of Philip Sidney. I do not see how one could be adapted from the other, or why, or why Marlowe would add a nod to the finished work to the abandoned one.
I just don't see how the preceding paragraphs lead to the penultimate one. I'm not a Sidney scholar, but it seems to me that the whole of Mary Sidney's life of letters up to that point is fascinating and generally accepted with occasional disagreements over print shop gossip. On the other hand, the notion that Mary took the unprecedented step of assuming the pen name of Shakespeare (who later turns up as a real person who apparently decided to assume that name as well) in order to write a riposte to all those back stage Tommy's in the figure of Venus and Adonis, well, that seems a bit of a stretch to me. Especially when the similarity to Hero and Leander is considered. Mary got her name into print well before 1593, so no real reason why she couldn't address the matter in person. I do not accept the notion that stooping to humble Nashe, Daniel, Greville or Florio would have been so beneath her that the Shakespeare ruse was necessary or even useful. I'd like to see some more support of the need for or utility of this disguise if it's available. Similarly, I continue to find a substantial disconnect between the known work of Lady Pembroke and the poem Venus and Adonis. Meanwhile, what have you to say about Harvey's allegation in L'Envoy, the tag to his Gorgon, or That Wonderful Yeare, that "The hugest miracle remains behind / The second Shakerley Rash-Swath to bind"?
As for the "substantial disconnect" between Mary's known work and Venus and Adonis, you will have to clarify for me to answer. Assuming Doleful Lay is correctly attributed by Spenser, she had already written a memorial for her brother in the same verse form. Fraunce establishes that she encouraged Ovidian stories of transformation in his honor, it is hardly a stretch to suggest she might have written one herself. Arefin et all (2014) places Mary's Psalms among the closest works to Venus and Adonis based on word usage despite the difference in genre (see here: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0111445)
Harvey suggests that the miracle or singularity which he associates with his Gentlewoman would have happened in 1588 but was delayed until 1593. Mary spent two years in seclusion at Wilton after her brother's death before triumphantly rejoining the court in 1588 as part of the coronation day procession celebrating the defeat of the Armada. Harvey may mean that she intended to publish her writing then but deferred because of the Armada, he suggest she will be recognized after the publication of V&A in 1593. An alternative reading concerns Harvey's brother Richard's prediction of a cataclysm based on astronomical alignment (something Nashe ridicules elsewhere). In any event I don't see how Harvey could be referring to Marlowe in light of the disparaging remarks you make in your next comment.
I think I mostly answered this in the comment on the previous post. The whole of Mary's life of letters up to this point constitutes the published translations of Antonie and Mornay, her Psalms, a couple short masques or dialogues attached to a presentation version of the Psalms apparently intended for the Queen (and possibly performed at some point), a translation of Petrarch's Triumph of Death which survived in second hand manuscript and a pair of memorial poems for her brother "to the Angel Spirit" and "the Doleful Lay of Clorinda" attached to Spenser's Colin Clout Comes Home Again. Nearly all of this work appears to have been completed in the years immediately following her brother's death, before Mary turned 30. There is no evidence that her interest in writing stopped at that time and her biographers note references to a substantial body of work beyond the ones listed which is somehow lost.
At least my reading of Harvey constitutes fairly direct testimony that Mary was the author of the Gentlewoman Poems which attacked Nashe, and I believe the textual links to Nashe's dedication to Astrophel and multiple references to Mary as Pallas and her spear constitute a compelling reason why the name William Shakespeare would immediately suggest her role in the work. With respect to an actual person name William Shakespeare (or Shakspere) the easiest explanation was that the man from Stratford was an actor associated with the company which suggested the name (or he was in fact the writer of the canon writing on behalf of Mary). I do not believe either of these are likely given the absence of evidence of such an actor or of connection to Stratford. I believe that the references to Shakespeare connected to the company are all to the pseudonymous writer who is most likely Mary and the connection to Stratford was made only after Shakspere's death by insertion in his will and placing the monument after the Folio was published. I don't understand your notion that "he turns up as a real person" if by that you mean as I think you suggested in your previous comment that he joined after the publication of Venus and Adonis as some sort of business manager.
My reading of Hero and Leander is that Marlowe acknowledges that as a distinct work by a different author, also in honor of Philip Sidney. I do not see how one could be adapted from the other, or why, or why Marlowe would add a nod to the finished work to the abandoned one.