By the extravagance of his assertions and the evangelical tone of his arguments, Hotson has made a cause of what is a matter for scholarly examination. His daring views and the insights they afford usually deserve careful consideration. Here, however, it is only necessary to evaluate those theories which directly affect staging at the Globe.
Hotson’s early attempts to prove the existence of “Shakespeare’s Arena Stage” at Whitehall Palace, contrary to what he chooses to believe, have not met with general approbation. Alois Nagler, for example, has shown that Hotson’s reading of atorno atorno, a phrase which appears in a description of a Court performance written by Virginio Orsino, Duke of Bracciano, does not mean, as Hotson contends, “completely around on every side,” but on three sides.[37] Nevertheless, extending his interpretation to the public playhouse, Hotson announces that persons of quality “customarily graced” the Globe’s stage. In fact, it was the outstanding characteristic of Elizabethan staging to locate the best seats on the stage and in the gallery over the stage. In establishing his proof, Hotson unfortunately neglects to mention the Induction to The Malcontent. This play, it will be remembered, was presented by the Globe company presumably in retaliation for the theft of one of their plays, Jeronimo, by the Children at Blackfriars. No other piece of evidence so surely reflects conditions at the Globe as this Induction, written by John Webster especially to justify the appearance of Marston’s satire at this public playhouse. To give the justification indisputable authority, Webster introduces the leading actors of the company, Dick Burbage, Henry Condell, and John Lowin, in their own persons, to explain the matter.
The Induction commences.
Enter W. Sly, a Tire-man following him with a stool.
Tire-man. Sir, the gentlemen will be angry if you sit here.
Sly. [as a gallant]. Why, we may sit upon the stage at the
private house.
Immediately it is apparent that, contrary to Hotson’s fancy, sitting on the stage was not the custom and its introduction was not happily countenanced by the “gentlemen.” Since the tire-man still holds the stool as he refers to the “gentlemen,” the word “here” must mean the stage as a whole and therefore the “gentlemen” are the actors. The one time Sly refers to any spectators, he does it in such terms that he clearly intends the groundlings. Otherwise, no mention is made of other spectators on the stage. Toward the end of the Induction, Lowin succeeds in ushering Sly out by offering to lead him to a “private room.”
Thomas Platter, who supposedly attended one of the opening performances at the Globe, in his enumeration of possible seats for the audience, makes no mention of seats on the stage. Dekker, in the widely known passage from The Gull’s Hornbook, does refer to sitting on the stage at the public playhouse, but Hotson takes seriously what is patently a satiric description of a fool intruding where he does not belong. Throughout the passage the stage sitter is referred to in the most derogatory terms, and what sharply contradicts Hotson’s contention is the injunction to the gallant that “though the Scar-scrows in the yard, hoot at you, hisse at you, spit at you, yea throw durt even in your teeth: tis most Gentlemanlike patience to endure all this.”[38] Were all those gentlemen who “customarily graced” the Globe stage treated in this fashion? Obviously the thrust of Dekker’s wit, coming as it did in 1609, was a vain endeavor to resist the press of gallants who sought to impose upon the public playhouse the privileges they enjoyed at the private.
Hotson also claims that the gentlemen sat “over the stage, i’ the lords roome.” For this claim he enjoys considerably more support. In and out of plays references to sitting “over the stage” suggest the employment in some way of the area I have called the above. But “over the stage” is not specific. Does “over” mean directly over, or to one side? Does it include the entire length of the stage wall, as Hosley asserts, so that actors in order to play their scenes above were obliged to thrust themselves into the midst of the auditors?[39]