A(lfred) L(eslie) (1903-) English popular historian. He published a biography of Shakespeare 1963, and in Shakespeare’s Sonnets: The Problems Solved 1973 controversially identified the “Dark Lady” of Shakespeare’s sonnets as Emilia Lanier, half-Italian daughter of a court musician, with whom the Bard is alleged to have had an affair 1593–95.
His other works include the scholarly Tudor Cornwall: Portrait of a Society 1941, 1969 and Shakespeare the Man 1973.