Sources Of English Playwrighting

Sources Of English Playwrighting

While Greek and Latin plays were set in either comedy or tragedy forms which dictated plot, characters and language, the plays of the Spanish and particularly the English Renaissance show a wider range. Two of the major sources for English plots, characters and form come from The Chronicle Play* and the The Broadsheet Drama*.

The Chronicle Play* - involves historical (or pseudo-historical) events. With wider use of the printing press historical writings proliferate and become available to dramatists. Plays in this category fall into four broad groups:

Historical-legendary deals with English doings before accurate histories were being written. These include plays like Gorboduc*, The Misfortunes of Arthur* and The History of King Leir and His Three Daughters* (c. 1590).

Historical proper picks up on known historical figures and events. These include a number of early plays dealing with rulers of England that will provide raw material for Shakespeare* (such as King Johan* by Bishop Bale,

c. 1550) as well as European historical events (such as Tamburlaine*.) Plays in this category often have trouble with the censor since they lend themselves to political bias and activism.

Biographical plays also come under special scrutiny from the censor if they deal with people of political significance. These tend to come slightly later than the historical proper plays and allow the dramatist to explore a particular character rather than centering on a range of events.

Popular legendary goes back to early folk drama (such as the mummers and their St. George.) This category includes Robin Hood dramas, tales of magicians and other folk characters.

The Broadsheet Drama* - tends to be tragic dramas of domestic and popular events. These show up after the use of broadsheets printed and distributed to spread local news. The plays make use of famous scandals and crimes and usually are murder plays. In many ways these plays are suprisingly similar to their soap opera descendents current today. The best examples of the type are the anonymous Arden of Feversham* (c. 1591), A Yorkshire Tragedy* (c. 1606) and A Warning for Fair Women* (c. 1599.)

Cooperative Playwrighting - At this point in history we need to be reminded that there is no such thing as copyright and

plagiarism is the done thing. Everybody who writes plays (as well as other forms of writing) makes use of anything and everything available. Playwrights sell their plays to performing companies which then "own" the production rights as long as they can hang on to them. They usually have only one copy of the plays (the prompt copy in the hands of the book-keeper) with a few scrolls for the players. Play-doctoring usually pays more than simply writing a play and selling it to a company. The actor who can fix up an old play is in big demand when

he is on salary or a share owner of the company. This is the case for Shakespeare* and other successful playwrights of this period. (Unlike the Spanish playwrights who can make a good living writing a lot and selling the results to religious as well as secular production groups.)

By and large a play is not regarded as literature and the last thing a company wants is to have one of their plays printed because then it would be available for the use of other producers. However, a lot of pirating goes on and garbled versions of plays that are performed do get into print. We can see this in the early publications of Shakespeare*'s plays in the Quarto* form (this refers to the size of the page used, they take a sheet of paper and fold it in two for a folio, in fourths for a quarto, and in eighths for an octavo.) For example the First Quarto of Hamlet* is two thousand lines long while the Second Quarto is nearly four thousand. With a popular play (such as this) the company may publish the work themselves after pirated editions have already appeared.

At This Point In English Theatre

PURITANISM AND THE THEATRE - The theatre had been under growing attack from the more militant elements of the religious

Reformation who come to be known as Puritans. The City (of London) and the Privy Council finds it useful to let the theatre take the heat. The main controversy is between the religious elements that object to what they perceive as the temptations of the Devil (all the arts) and the Court's desire for entertainment and international status as patron of the arts. The problem is further complicated by the matter of money. Puritans object to governmental expenditures (which they fund in the taxes they pay) for the "charms of Satan." For the Puritans, any agreeable emotion that does not obviously come direct from God is evil. This puts the theatre Reformation who come to be known as Puritans. The City (of London) and the Privy Council finds it useful to let the theatre take the heat. The main controversy is between the religious elements that object to what they perceive as the temptations of the Devil (all the arts) and the Court's desire for entertainment and international status as patron of the arts. The problem is further complicated by the matter of money. Puritans object to governmental expenditures (which they fund in the taxes they pay) for the "charms of Satan." For the Puritans, any agreeable emotion that does not obviously come direct from God is evil. This puts the theatre

1587 - The first company of English players abroad shows up touring in Germany. Back in England we find The Spanish Tragedy* by Thomas Kyd* (c. 1588-94), full of revenge, blood, ghosts and passionate blank verse. It is a stunning success and the first great part for that up and coming actor, Edward Allyen*. This play starts the theatrical ball rolling. Kyd* is the dominant theatrical influence for the great playwrights currently rising in the theatre. The style will come to be known as the Elizabethan tragedy of blood. Hardly anything is known about Kyd* and, although he may have written a number of other plays, only one other is positively known to be his (Pompey the Great also known as Cornelia*, 1594.)

Next we find the first great play of the English Renaissance, Tamburlaine* the Great, Part I (Part II will show up in a year or so) by Christopher Marlowe.

* [Note: the most recent revival of this play was in 1976.] Marlowe* is twenty- three and out to sweep "trumpery" from the tragic stage. His major weapon is the mighty iambic line [the poetic unaccented, accented "foot" which best suits the English language, especially in units of five (iambic pentameter).]

This play reveals the English poetic drama in an integrated form with the full assimilation of the Senecan metrical form into what has come to be called the "mighty line." This production has the advantage of being produced by the Admiral's Men* with Edward Allyen* in the title role. It is a knock-out success and is revived off and on for over fifty years.

This particular moment when a language develops a dramatic voice of its own seems to occur in every country at some definite time in its development. When a playwright emerges who gives voice to this use of language a surge of great playwrighting follows. We will see this in other countries. There is little doubt that Shakespeare* (as well as all other English tragic playwrights) is influenced by productions of Marlowe*'s plays.

The other event of importance to the English stage is that Inigo Jones* (1573-1652) starts studying to be an architect. We'll hear a good deal more about him later.

Meanwhile, events go on - EXPLORATION AND COLONIZATION BY THE ENGLISH - Ever since the Eastern trade routes were cut by the Turks all European powers have been

scrambling for ways to reach those spices and other goodies in China, Japan and India. The Portuguese are busy with their way around Africa, followed closely by the Spanish finding their way around South America. Both these Iberian countries [that peninsula sticking out of Europe into the Atlantic is called the Iberian peninsula] have the state finance their explorers and colonists. This is not, however, the English way. As the currently most democratic country in the world, the English prefer private enterprise (where they can keep the profits) to government finance (where the people still have to pay the costs but state keeps the profits) for such activities. Once the Spanish Armada is defeated the English will embark on exploration and colonization with a zeal and determination unmatched by their competitors.

Three forces will drive this activity (two of them powered by the desire for lots of money.) The first force is the need for a passage to those Eastern markets. Since

those Iberians have the current monopoly on the African and South American routes, the English (and the French) are looking for a Northwest Passage around or through that still undefined North American land.

The second force at work is the belief that Britain is overcrowded and needs "plantations" or colonies in which to put the surplus poor population. These plantations, it is hoped, will become richly productive sources of various raw materials needed back home.

The third force is more private, but encouraged by the government. This concerns the religious diversity spreading throughout Britain and causing social and political unrest. Remember that England is now officially Anglican. This distresses the remaining Catholics. Then there is the spread and proliferation of various Protestant sects. England is home to a rising tide of Puritans* who want to purify the Anglican Church rituals and accouterments. The State Church would much rather send these religious dissenters off somewhere than deal with them at home. (The French will also find this a viable thing to do). We will go into this religious stuff a little later in more detail.

1588-1590 - Christopher Marlowe* comes out with more stunning successes, (the exact dates of when they were written is a little fuzzy) The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus*, The Jew of Malta*, and Edward II*. These plays also continue to be produced until the theatres are closed in 1642.

In Italy, at Sabbionetta*, the guy who finished the Teatro Olimpico, Vincenzo Scamozzi* (1552-1616) builds a small theatre that will set the style for the main developmental line of buildings for play production.

A lot of English criticism appears about now. Despite all that religious warfare in France we hear about some French provincial troupes touring.

1589 Galileo* is now a professor of mathematics at Pisa. The first Bourbon* king of France, Henry IV*, comes to the throne. 1589 - In Florence under the de'Medici,* the talented architect and supervisor of

entertainments, Bernardo Buontalenti* (1536-1608) is doing his finest work. (He does this job for almost sixty years.) This particular spectacular is in celebration of a marriage and runs for

a solid month including an elaborate water procession (naumachia*) on the Arno River, lots of comedies and intermezzi. One of the indoor spectacles imitates the ones on real water and has such things as a mythological figure moving through the fake waves on a shell with dolphins and Tritons. This indoor show has a ship with twenty sailors and a guy in the crow's nest singing songs while the dolphins dance below. Later Buontalenti's pupil, Giulio Parigi* (1570-1635), will teach the Englishman, Inigo Jones*, how to do all this stuff.

1590 In England - this is a year of disastrous harvests, art, on the other hand, is blooming and Puritans* (who are strictly anti-art) object. There is population overcrowding and the gulf between rich and poor widens. Food prices keep rising and the ranks of the poor are swelled by the unemployed. All this increases the number and kind of laws enacted to fund workhouses, cope with paupers and vagrants, and leads, eventually, to plans to establish colonies in the New World. In Ireland resistance has been growing in reaction to English colonization there and this year the Irish revolt under Hugh O'Neil*, the Earl of Tyrone.

In India Akbar* takes more territory (Sind, Baluchistan, Kandahar, Kasmir) and makes the Hindu Kush (that huge mountain range) the frontier between his Indian empire and territory of the other Mongols.

1590 - In Italy we get to that second really popular Pastoral* play, The Faithful Shepherd*, by Giambattista Guarini*. The Italian Commedia dell'Arte* company, I Accesi*, begins activities.

In Portugal theatres are closed frequently.