Shakespeare's environment

by C. C. Stopes

To few pioneers is it given to initiate, and also to develope into completeness, any great new form of national art. Chaucer was not our first poet, Shakespeare was not our first dramatist. Our first architect, our first musician, our first painter, would be hard to find. But we know where to look for our “first builder of playhouses.”

A remarkable man he must have been, strong of physique, intellect and courage, strenuous, many-sided, imaginative, far-seeing, irrepressible. A special strain of genius must have prepared him to face difficulties thrown in his way during the development of his great Idea.

In all our discussions about the Shakespeare Memorial and the National Theatre, it would be well to remember what one man did towards that end 330 years ago.

James Burbage, the joiner by apprenticeship, the player by inspiration, the manager by sheer superiority, formed the best company of players of his day, and persuaded the greatest Earl of the kingdom to secure him the first Royal Patent to players, a patent which raised them from being “vagabonds” into artists. With a strategic skill worthy of a great commander, he circumvented the fettering edicts of the Common Council by carrying his company outside their jurisdiction, and, in seeming to obey the regulations against playing in inn-yards or in open spaces, reared for himself an edifice in which he could foster and develope the national drama, an edifice which he had the foresight to name “The Theatre.” The special and particular name he chose has become the generic name or patronymic of all its descendants. Within the wooden walls of his citadel, protected by doorkeepers, he had an opportunity, not only of earning money, but of educating the people, superintending at the same time a school of actors and a school of dramatists. To him came the honour of rearing a son whom he trained to be the greatest tragedian of his day; to him came the proud satisfaction of finding and training the provincial player who helped him to make his name; to him came the appreciative insight into the powers of this “fellow,” which led him to encourage Shakespeare to make use of his opportunities of patching and improving old plays until he could stand alone; to him came the crowning glory of seeing his man become the greatest dramatist of his time. And all this was done in about twenty years! What actor-manager has ever done like unto him? And all that he did was achieved under the stress and strain of active opposition from many quarters; he was constantly being harassed by regulation, legislation, and litigation with rivals, relatives, and landlords, eager to share in the profits of his phenomenal financial success (which, however, through his heavy expenses must have been much less than they supposed it to be). He was a pioneer, but he had more than his fair share of fighting to do. The Curtain “rose like an exhalation” in his wake, and left no records in its train. His very popularity made his path more thorny.

It may be well to collect what little is known of him. Halliwell-Phillips, that industrious writer, discovered many points, but his reticence, or at least haziness, about references has prevented his successors from following him to his originals. He is generally correct in his transcripts, but not always so; his inferences are sometimes erroneous; he did not cover the whole possible field, so there are many fresh references to be brought forward, not, perhaps, of prime importance, but still important enough to help to complete “the idea of the life” of James Burbage.

We do not know when or where he was born or educated, what was the occupation of his father, or when he joined the Earl of Leicester’s servants. We do know that he was bred a joiner, and must have been a member of the company, as he is frequently described as a “joiner,” in his legal actions, even after one would have thought another description of him would have been more suitable. But any citizen then, even in the lesser companies, was reckoned more respectable than a “player.” Think of his times. On 12th February 1563 Edward, Bishop of London, wrote to advise Sir William Cecil to inhibit all players, at least for a year, it would be well if it could be for ever. They spread the plague and profaned Holy things; “the Histriones, the common players,” are “an idle sort of people which have been infamous in all good commonwealths.” In 1572 Queen Elizabeth enacted the famous statute[51] that “Rogues, Vagabonds ... fencers, Bearwards, Common Players, and Minstrels not belonging to any baron of the Realm shall be judged Vagabonds,” and made liable to be whipped and sent to some respectable service. To satisfy the Queen’s private tastes, however, and their own, many barons helped the better class of players by enrolling them as their “servants,” and thus securing them some ill-defined privileges. But the City strongly disapproved of plays and players. On 2nd March 1573-4 the Lord Mayor declined to license a place in the City, even for the servants of the Earl of Sussex; on the 22nd the Privy Council asked the Lord Mayor what cause made him thus restrain plays. Dissatisfied with his reply, the Earl of Leicester, determined that his servants should not be put to such an indignity, secured the first Royal Patent under the Privy Seal for them, which introduced James Burbage into the history of his country. As it gave him, on paper, a large liberty, and raised his craft to the level of an art, often as it has been printed, it is important to start with it in any history of the stage. One forgets sometimes. On 7th May 1574 the Royal Patent warned all officials to permit

to James Burbage, John Perkyn, John Laneham, William Johnson, Robert Wylson and others, servants to our trustie and well-beloved Cousin and Councillor, the Earl of Leicester, to use, exercise and occupie the art and facultie of playing Comedies, Tragedies, Interludes, Stage Plaies, and such other, like as they have already used and studied or hereafter shall use and study, as well as for the recreacion of our loving subjects as for our solace and pleasure when we shall think good to see them ... together with their musick ... as well within our City of London and the Liberties of the same, as also within the liberties and freedoms of any other cytyes, towns, boroughes, &c., whatsoever, throughout our realm of England; willing and commanding you and every of you, as ye tender our pleasure, to permit and suffer them therein without any your letts, hindrance or molestation, any act, statute, proclamation or commandment heretofore made, or hereafter to be made to the contrary notwithstanding. Provided that the same ... be allowed by our Master of the Revells, and that they be not published or shewen in the time of Common Prayer, or in the time of great and common plague in our said City of London.

Nothing could have been more explicit, or more exasperating to the Corporation of London, than this permission to contravene their mandates.[52] The Corporation’s counterblast was the famous Order of 6th December 1574. They threatened fine and imprisonment to any who “played without a licence from the City each time,” and without giving half the proceeds to the poor. They did not “tender the Queen’s pleasure” in respect to the players.[53]

At the close of 1574, on St. Stephen’s Day, the Earl of Leicester’s servants played before the Queen at Court, and opened the year by playing on New Year’s Day, 1574-5.

Other noblemen hastened to request Royal Patents for their servants. The battle between the Privy Council and the Common Council raged all the more hotly since the players had been “patented,” and the climax came when the Lord Mayor expelled all players from the City, under an undated “Order for the relief of the Poor” printed by Singleton.