Shakespeare's Lost Years in London, 1586-1592 Part 4

Textual criticism has long since proved, however, that this was not a new play in 1592--though marked "ne" by Henslowe--but merely a revision. Three hands are distinctly traceable in it; the unknown original author who wrote the opening lines:

"Hung be the heavens with black, yield day to night!

Comets, importing change of times and states, Brandish your crystal tresses in the sky, And with them scourge the bad revolting stars That have consented unto Henry's death!"

Whoever wrote these lines, it is very palpable that Shakespeare did not.

The second hand in the play was the reviser of 1592 who introduced the Talbot pa.s.sages. There cannot be the slightest doubt that this was George Peele, who in 1592, and for some time before and later, was the princ.i.p.al producer and reviser of plays for the Lord Admiral's company.

The cla.s.sical allusions in the Talbot scenes, and the manner in which they are always lugged in by the ear, as though for adornment, plainly proclaim the hand of Peele, and as plainly disa.s.sociate Shakespeare from their composition. The third hand is clearly Shakespeare's. The "Temple Garden" scene has been accepted by practically all critics as unquestionably his work; it is not the work, either, of his "pupil pen."

His revision was evidently not made until 1594, when the Lord Chamberlain's company brought the MS. with them as a portion of their properties, upon their return to Burbage. The references to red and white roses, as the badges of Lancaster and York, were evidently then introduced by Shakespeare in order to link together, and give dramatic continuity to, the whole historical series connected with the Wars of the Roses, upon which he had already worked, or was then working for his company. There is not a single cla.s.sical allusion in the "Temple Garden" scene, while there are twenty-seven cla.s.sical allusions in the whole play: eight of them being in the Talbot pa.s.sages. In Shakespeare's _Richard II._--which I shall give good evidence was written within about a year of the time that _Henry VI._ was presented as a new play--there are two cla.s.sical allusions. In any authentic play by Marlowe, Greene, or Peele of an equal length there will be found from forty to eighty cla.s.sical allusions, besides, as a rule, a number of Latin quotations.

In revising the first part of _Henry VI._ in, or after, 1594, it is evident that Shakespeare eliminated many cla.s.sical allusions, and that in the early work which he did upon _The Contention_, and also in his final revision of _The Contention_, into the second and third parts of _Henry VI._, he eliminated cla.s.sical allusions, reducing the average in these plays to from thirty to thirty-five. In his own acknowledged historical plays, _Richard II._, _King John_, _Richard III._, _Henry IV._, and _Henry V._, _there is not an average of six cla.s.sical allusions_.

When the settled animus which Nashe, in conjunction with Greene, between 1589-92, displays against Shakespeare is better understood, the utter improbability of his referring to Shakespeare's work in a laudatory manner in the latter year shall readily be seen. When, also, the high praise which Nashe bestows upon Peele in the same publications in which he attacks Shakespeare is noted, it becomes evident that he again intends to commend Peele in his complimentary allusion to the Talbot scenes. Peele was the princ.i.p.al writer and reviser for Henslowe at this period, while not one of Shakespeare's plays is mentioned in his whole _Diary_.

While I believe that the reference to Shakespeare's name in _Edward I._--which was first noticed by Mr. Fleay--was actually intended by Peele, the pa.s.sage in which it occurs pertains to an early form of the play, which was old when it was published in 1593. It was written by Peele for the Lord Admiral's company before their conjunction with Strange's men under Henslowe, and at the time when they acted with Lord Hunsdon's company at the Theatre in Sh.o.r.editch in summer, and at the Crosskeys in the winter. It is significant that this play was not acted by Lord Strange's men during their tenure of the Rose Theatre, and that in 1595, after they had separated from Henslowe, it was revised and presented as a new play by the Lord Admiral's company. It is quite likely that it was the property of Pembroke's company in 1592-93. The allusion to Shakespeare in this play is probably the first evidence we possess of the well-authenticated fact that as an actor he usually appeared in kingly parts. It is recorded of him that he played the part of the ghost in _Hamlet_, and his friend, John Davies, the poet, writes in 1603:

"Some say, good Will, which I in sport do sing, Hadst thou not played some kingly parts in sport, Thou hadst been a companion for a King."

The reference to his name by Peele in _Edward I._, in which play Shakespeare evidently took the part of John Baliol, the Scottish King, is as follows:

"Shine with thy golden head, _Shake_ thy _speare_, in honour of his name, Under whose royalty thou wear'st the same."

Against the a.s.sumption that Shakespeare acted with Lord Strange's company under Alleyn and Henslowe for two years, there is some positive, and much inferential, evidence, the strongest of the latter being that between the end of 1590 and the middle of 1594, at about which latter date the Lord Chamberlain's company parted from Henslowe, Shakespeare produced,--as I shall later demonstrate,--in addition to _Venus and Adonis_, _Lucrece_, and nearly half of the whole body of his _Sonnets_, at least seven new plays, not one of which was performed at the Rose by Lord Strange's company. The remainder of the evidence against this a.s.sumption shall develop in this history.

We may infer that Henslowe in entering into business relations with Lord Strange's company would make quite as binding a contract with them as we find him making a few years later with the Lord Admiral's men. In those contracts he binds the players to play at the Rose and "at no other house publicly about London"; further stipulating that should the London theatres be closed by the authorities for any reason "then to go for the time into the country, then to return again to London."

The fact that his manager, and son-in-law, Edward Alleyn, accompanied Lord Strange's men upon their provincial tour in 1593, when, owing to the plague, the London theatres were closed by order of the Council, implies a similar understanding with this company.

The words "in any other house publicly about London" in Henslowe's contracts with players apparently infer that they retained the right of giving private and Court performances upon their own account and for their own profit. The money they received for Court performances appears to have belonged exclusively to the players, as the total amount collected by them is at times turned over to Henslowe in part payment of their corporate indebtedness to him, and credited to them in full. Had Henslowe shared in these payments his portion would have been deducted from the credits. It is evident that he was merely the financial backer of, and not a sharer in, this company.

In the apparently comprehensive list of the members of Lord Strange's company--as it existed early in 1592--which was owned by Edward Alleyn and is now preserved at Dulwich College, while Pope and Bryan, who came from Leicester's company, and Richard Burbage and others, no doubt, who came from Lord Hunsdon's company are mentioned, Shakespeare's name does not appear. There is no reason why he should not have been mentioned in this list had he been a member of the company at that time. About three years later, when Strange's men had separated from Henslowe and the Admiral's men, and returned to Burbage, Shakespeare is mentioned, with William Kempe and Richard Burbage, in the Court records as receiving payment for Court performances, from which we may infer that he was regarded as one of the leading members of, and was also a sharer in, the company at this time.

Where, then, was Shakespeare during the period of Henslowe's management?

What company of players performed in the plays he produced between about the end of 1590 and the middle of 1594, which are--_The Comedy of Errors_, _Love's Labour's Lost_, _Love's Labour's Won_, _The Two Gentlemen of Verona_, _King John_, _Richard II._, _Richard III._, and _Midsummer Night's Dream_? Later on I shall advance conclusive evidence to prove that all of these plays were written in this interval, though most of them were materially revised in later years.

In order to answer these questions it will be advisable to revert to a consideration of the drastic changes which took place between the end of 1588 and the beginning of 1592, in the comparative standing, as well as in the personnel, of several of the most prominent companies of players.

I have shown that early in 1589 a union took place between the leading members of Lord Strange's tumblers, the Lord Admiral's, the Lord Chamberlain's, and the Earl of Leicester's men. If an average of only three men were taken from each of these companies--forming a company of twelve players, which was then regarded as a large company--it would necessarily leave a considerable number of men free to make new connections, as three of the companies involved in the changes disappear from the records at that time. Thereafter we hear no more of Lord Strange's tumblers, nor of Lord Leicester's, nor Lord Hunsdon's players.

It is not unlikely, then, that while some of the players discarded from the three companies that had gone out of existence would drift into different existing companies, that some of them would unite to form a new company. The disruption of the Queen's company in 1590-91 would also leave some men at large. As most of these men had been previously connected with well-known companies, which performed princ.i.p.ally in London, it is likely that they would endeavour to continue as London performers instead of forming a provincial company.

That such a company for London performances was actually formed some time in 1591 is evident in the appearance of a company--hitherto unheard of for sixteen years--under the patronage of the Earl of Pembroke.

Between the years 1576 and 1592 there is no mention of a company acting under this n.o.bleman's licence in either the provincial or Court records, nor is there any mention of, or reference to, such a company in any London records.

All we know about this new company is that record of it appeared for the first time in December 1592, when it played twice before the Court; that it returned to London in the early autumn of 1593 after a disastrous tour in the provinces, being compelled to p.a.w.n a portion of its properties to pay expenses; that Marlowe wrote _Edward II._ for it in about 1593; that _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_ was one of its properties, and that Shakespeare was connected with either the revision or the theatrical presentation of this play at the period that it belonged to Pembroke's company, _i.e._ in 1592, as he is attacked by Greene on that score at this time.

Owing to the prevalence of the plague in London in 1593, and early in 1594, the public performance of plays was prohibited. The Earl of Pembroke's company, which had failed to make its expenses travelling, and which was not allowed to play in London on account of the plague, evidently disrupted in the spring or summer of 1594; and as some of its members joined Henslowe at this time and some of the properties came to the Burbage organisation, we may infer that they were brought as properties by men who came from Pembroke's company to Burbage.

Edward Alleyn, who toured the provinces in the summer of 1593 with Lord Strange's company, and for the same reason that Pembroke's toured at this time, _i.e._ owing to the plague in London, wrote to Henslowe in September 1593, from the country, inquiring as to the whereabouts of Pembroke's company, and was told by Henslowe that they had returned to London five or six weeks before, as they could not make their charges travelling. He further informed him that he had heard that they were compelled to p.a.w.n their apparel. The fact that the fortunes of Pembroke's company should be a matter of interest to Alleyn and Henslowe appears to imply that it was a new theatrical venture of some importance, and that it probably had in its membership some of the Admiral's, Strange's, or Queen's company's old players. That a new company should play twice before the Court, in what was evidently the first or second year of its existence, speaks well for the influence of its management and for the quality of its plays and performances. After this mention of Pembroke's company in Henslowe's letter to Alleyn in September 1593, we hear nothing further concerning it as an independent company until 1597. At that time Gabriel Spencer and Humphrey Jeffes, who were evidently Pembroke's men in 1592-93, became members of, and sharers in, the Lord Admiral's company, with which they had evidently worked--though under Pembroke's licence--between 1594 and 1597.

It is now agreed by critics that the Admiral's and Chamberlain's men, who had been united under Alleyn for the past two years, divided their forces and fortunes in June 1594, or earlier. It is evident that some of Pembroke's company's plays were absorbed by the Lord Chamberlain's company, and that a few of the Pembroke men joined the Lord Admiral's company at this time. As evidence of the absorption of the plays of Pembroke's men by Lord Strange's players is the fact that between 3rd and 13th June 1594, when Strange's players acted under Henslowe for the last time, three of the seven plays they then presented,--_Hamlet_, _Andronicus_, and _The Taming of a Shrew_,--while all old plays, were new to the repertory of Strange's company presented upon Henslowe's stages, and furthermore, that all three of these plays were rewritten--or alleged to have been rewritten--by Shakespeare. At about the same time that Pembroke's company ceased to exist the Earl of Suss.e.x's company, which had recently played for Henslowe, was also disrupted. It is evident that some of these men joined the Lord Admiral's and the Lord Chamberlain's companies also, and that in this manner the Lord Chamberlain's company secured _Andronicus_, which had lately been played by the Earl of Suss.e.x's men as well as by Pembroke's men.

Humphrey Jeffes and Gabriel Spencer, whose names are mentioned in _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_, which was played by Pembroke's company in 1592-93, and who, we may therefore infer, were members of Pembroke's company in those years, or else were members of the company that previously owned this play, are mentioned as playing with the Lord Admiral's company as Pembroke's men in 1597. The name of John Sinkler, who is mentioned as one of Lord Strange's men in Edward Alleyn's list, which evidently represents the company as it appeared in the first performance of _Four Plays in One_ at the Rose Theatre upon 6th March 1592, also appears with that of Gabriel Spencer and Humphrey Jeffes in _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_. From this we may infer either that Sinkler left Strange's company and joined Pembroke's men after this date, or else that he, Spencer, and Jeffes, before 1592, were members of the company that originally owned the play. It is very evident that the originals of the three parts of _Henry VI._ were old plays composed at about the time of the Spanish Armada, and, it is generally agreed, for the Queen's company. As _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_--in common with _Hamlet_ and _The Taming of a Shrew_--was also later revised or rewritten by Shakespeare, into the play now known as _Henry VI., Part III._, it evidently came from Pembroke's company to Lord Strange's company, along with _Hamlet_ and _The Taming of a Shrew_ in 1594. Later on I shall adduce evidence showing that _The Taming of a Shrew_ and _Hamlet_ were owned and acted by a company, or companies, a.s.sociated with the Burbage interests previous to the amalgamation of 1589, and that _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_, which was an old play in 1592, probably originally written by Greene, was revised in that year by Marlowe and Shakespeare for Pembroke's company, and that its final change into the play now known as _Henry VI., Part III._, was made by Shakespeare in, or after, 1594, when he rejoined the Lord Chamberlain's company.

Within a year of the time that Marlowe, with Shakespeare, revised _The True Tragedy of the Duke of York_ for Pembroke's men in 1592, Marlowe also wrote _Edward II._ for this company, Shakespeare producing _Richard II._ for the company at the same time. The friendly co-operation between Shakespeare and Marlowe, which I shall show commenced in 1588-89, and which aroused Greene's jealousy at that time, was evidently continued until the death of Marlowe in June 1593. It is in the historical plays composed or revised between 1591-93 by Shakespeare that Marlowe's influence is most apparent, as also is Shakespeare's influence upon Marlowe in his one play which we know was produced at the same period.

_Edward II._ is much more Shakespearean in character than any other of Marlowe's plays. It is evident that their close a.s.sociation at this time reacted favourably upon the work of each of them.

The deductions I draw from these and other facts and inferences still to be developed, is, that shortly after the Lord Admiral's and Lord Strange's men pa.s.sed under Alleyn's and Henslowe's management, some time between Christmas 1590 and Christmas 1591, Shakespeare formed Lord Pembroke's company, becoming its leader and also its princ.i.p.al producer of plays, and that it was through his influence and the reputation that certain of his early plays had already attained in Court circles that this new company was enabled to appear twice before the Court in the Christmas season of 1592. To demonstrate this hypothesis it will be necessary to revert to a consideration of Shakespeare's status in theatrical affairs between 1588-89 and 1594.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 19: E.K. Chambers in _Modern Language Review_, Oct. 1906.]

CHAPTER V

SHAKESPEARE AND THE SCHOLARS

1588-1594

In considering the conditions of Shakespeare's life at the beginning of his career in London, and his application to the College of Heralds for a grant of arms in 1596, it must be borne in mind that social distinctions and cla.s.s gradations at that time still retained much of their feudal significance. At that period an actor, unless protected by the licence of a n.o.bleman or gentleman, was virtually a vagrant before the law, while felonies committed by scholars were still clergyable.

When Ben Jonson was indicted for killing Gabriel Spencer in 1598, he pleaded and received benefit of clergy, his only legal punishment consisting in having the inside of his thumb branded with the Tyburn "T," and it is unlikely that even this was inflicted.

While a university degree thus enhanced both the social and legal status of sons of yeomen and tradesmen, the sons of equally reputable people who became actors were correspondingly debased both socially and legally.

Though the established status which the actors' profession attained during Shakespeare's connection with the stage--and largely through his elevating influence--made these legal disabilities of an actor a dead letter, it still continued to militate against the social standing of its members. John Davies leaves record that at the accession of James I. it was gossiped that Shakespeare, had he not formerly been an actor, instead of being appointed Groom of the Privy Chamber, might have received the higher appointment of Gentleman of the Privy Chamber. This idea owed its birth to Shakespeare's friendship with the Earl of Southampton, whose influence in the early days of the new Court--when he himself stood high in favour--secured the office for his other protege, John Florio, one of the gentlemen by the grace of a university degree who joined issue with the "university pens" against Shakespeare, and who in consequence--as I shall later demonstrate--shall be pilloried to far-distant ages in the character of Sir John Falstaff. Though Shakespeare had acquired a legal badge of gentility with his coat of arms in 1599, the histrionic taint--according to Davies--proved a bar to his official promotion.

"Some say, good Will, which I in sport do sing, Hadst thou not played some kingly parts in sport, Thou hadst been a companion to a King And been a King among the meaner sort."

Arrogance towards social inferiors, as well as servility to superiors, is always manifested most offensively in the manners of those who are themselves conscious of equivocal social standing. I shall adduce evidence to prove that from the time we first begin dimly to apprehend Shakespeare in his London environment, in 1588-89, until his final return to Stratford in about 1610, he was continuously and spitefully attacked and vilified by a coterie of jealous scholars who, while lifted above him socially by the arbitrary value attaching to a university degree, were in no other sense his superiors either in birth or breeding. It was evidently, then, the contemptuous att.i.tude of his jealous scholastic rivals, as well as the accruing material advantages involved, that impelled Shakespeare in 1596 to apply, through his father, to the College of Heralds for official confirmation of a grant of arms alleged to have been made to his forebears.

Shakespeare's earliest scholastic detractor was Robert Greene, who evidently set much store by his acquired gentility, as he usually signed his publications as "By Robert Greene, Master of Arts in Cambridge," and who, withal, was a most licentious and unprincipled libertine, going, through his ill-regulated course of life, dishonoured and unwept to a pauper's grave at the age of thirty-two. After the death of Greene, when his memory was a.s.sailed by Gabriel Harvey and others whom he had offended, his friend Nashe, who attempted to defend him, finding it difficult to do so, makes up for the lameness of his defence by the bitterness of his attack on Harvey. Nashe, in fact, resents being regarded as an intimate of Greene's, yet his, and Greene's, spiteful and ill-bred reflections upon Shakespeare's social quality, education, and personal appearance, between 1589 and 1592, were received sympathetically by the remainder of the "gentlemen poets,"--as they styled themselves in contradistinction to the stage poets,--and used thereafter for years as a keynote to their own jealous abuse of him.

John Florio, in his _First Fruites_, published in 1591, and after he had entered the service of the Earl of Southampton, though not yet a.s.sailing Shakespeare personally, as did these other scholars, appears as a critic of his historical dramatic work.

In 1593 George Peele, in his _Honour of the Garter_, re-echoes the slurs against Shakespeare voiced by Greene in the previous year. In the same year George Chapman, who thereafterwards proved to be Shakespeare's arch-enemy among the "gentlemen scholars," caricatures him and his affairs in a new play, which he revised, in conjunction with John Marston, six years later, under the t.i.tle of _Histriomastix, or The Player Whipt_. Neither the authorship, date of production, nor satirical intention of the early form of the play has previously been known.

In 1594 Chapman again attacks Shakespeare in _The Hymns to the Shadow of Night_, as well as in the prose dedication written to his colleague, Matthew Roydon. In the same year Roydon enters the lists against Shakespeare by publishing a satirical and scandalous poem reflecting upon, and distorting, his private affairs, ent.i.tled _Willobie his Avisa_. From this time onward until the year 1609-10, Chapman, Roydon, and John Florio--who in the meantime had joined issue with them--continue to attack and vilify Shakespeare. Every reissue, or attempted reissue, of _Willobie his Avisa_ was intended as an attack upon Shakespeare. Such reissues were made or attempted in 1596-1599-1605 and 1609, though some of them were prevented by the action of the public censor who, we have record, condemned the issue of 1596 and prevented the issue of 1599. As no copies of the 1605 or 1609 issues are now extant, it is probable that they also were estopped by the authorities.

In 1598-99 these partisans (Chapman, Roydon, and Florio) are joined by John Marston, and a year later, also by Ben Jonson, when, for three or four years, Chapman, Jonson, and Marston collaborate in scurrilous plays against Shakespeare and friends who had now rallied to his side. In about 1598 Thomas Dekker and Henry Chettle joined sides with Shakespeare and answered his opponents' attacks by satirising them in plays. John Florio, while not partic.i.p.ating in the dramatic warfare, attacks Shakespeare viciously in the dedication to his _Worlde of Wordes_, in 1598, and comes in for his share of the satirical chastis.e.m.e.nt which Shakespeare, Dekker, and Chettle administer to them in acted, as well as in published, plays.

As Ben Jonson's dramatic reputation became a.s.sured the heat of his rivalry against Shakespeare died down; his vision cleared and broadened and he, more plainly than any writer of his time, or possibly since his time, realised Shakespeare in his true proportions. Jonson, in time, tires of Chapman's everlasting envy and misanthropy, and quarrels with him and in turn becomes the object of Chapman's invectives. After Shakespeare's death Jonson made amends for his past ill-usage by defending his memory against Chapman, who, even then, continued to belittle his reputation.

While various critics have from time to time apprehended a critical att.i.tude upon the part of certain contemporary writers towards Shakespeare, they have usually regarded such indications as they may have noticed, merely as pa.s.sing and temporary ebullitions, but no conception of the bitterness and continuity of the hostility which actually existed has previously been realised. Much of the evidence of the early antagonism of Greene and Nashe to Shakespeare has been entirely misunderstood, while their reflections against other dramatists and actors are supposed to have been directed against him. Past critics have been utterly oblivious of the fact that Florio, Roydon, and Chapman and others colluded for many years in active hostility to Shakespeare.

In publications issued between 1585 and 1592 Robert Greene vents his displeasure against various dramatic writers whose plays had proved more popular than his, as well as against the companies of actors, their managers, and the theatre that favoured his rivals. The writers and actor-managers whom he attacks have been variously identified by past writers. Mr. Richard Simpson, one of the most acute, ingenious, and painstaking pioneers in Shakespearean research, whose _School of Shakespeare_ was issued after his death in 1878, supposed that all of Greene's attacks in these years, including those in which his friend, Thomas Nashe, collaborated with him, were directed against Shakespeare and Marlowe. Since Mr. Simpson wrote, however, now over forty years ago, some new light has been thrown upon the theatrical companies, and their connection with the writers of the period with which he dealt, which negatives many of his conclusions. While it is evident that Greene was jealous of, and casts reflections upon, Marlowe, to whom he refers as "Merlin" and "the athiest Tamburlaine," Mr. Fleay has since proved that several of Greene's veiled reflections were directed against others. Mr.

Fleay's suggestion that Robert Wilson was the Roscius so frequently referred to by Greene and Nashe is, however, based upon incorrect inference, though he proves by several characteristic parallels, which he adduces between lines in _The Three Ladies of London_, _The Three Lords and Three Ladies_, and _Fair Em_,--the last of which is satirically alluded to by Greene in his _Farewell to Folly_, in 1591,--that they were all three either written, or revised, by the same hand. While his ascription of the composition of the first two of these plays to Wilson is probably also correct, his a.s.sumption that Wilson was a writer and an actor for Lord Strange's company in 1591 was due to lack of collected and compiled records concerning the Elizabethan companies of players at the time he wrote, which have since been made available.[20]

There is nothing whatever known of Robert Wilson after 1583, when he is mentioned, along with Tarleton, as being selected by Tilney, the Master of the Revels, for the Queen's company. In an appended note I a.n.a.lyse the literary evidence upon which Mr. Fleay a.s.sociates Robert Wilson with Strange's company in 1589-91.[21]

Robert Wilson must have been pa.s.se as an actor in 1589, if indeed he was then living, while Strange's company was composed of younger and rising men, all recently selected for their histrionic abilities from several companies, amongst which, it appears evident, the Queen's company was not then included, though it is likely that in 1591 some Queen's men joined Strange's company. That Robert Wilson was not the Roscius referred to by Greene and Nashe in 1589 and 1590 a further examination of the evidence will fully verify.