A brief introduction to William Shakespeare and his time

 

William Shakespeare: 

Birth: 23rd April, 1564

*23rd April is also the National Day of England.

Baptism: 26th April 

Father: John Shakespeare 

Mother: Mary Arden 

Will's father John Shakespeare was involved in a series of profession. He was an ale-tester, constable, burgess, chamberlain, alderman successively. Lastly, he was entitled as 'Master', rather than simply as 'Goodman'. In 1568, he became mayor in the highest elective office in the town. 

*** The dark aspects of John Shakespeare's nature: 

# In 1570, his father was prosecuted for trading wool business and for lending money illegally. 

# Usury was considered as a vice "most odious and detestable" and John seemed to be involved in this mischief at a seriously committed level. 

# He was accused of making loans worth 220 pounds including interest to a Walter Mussum. 

# In the year 1571, he was charged with having 8400 pounds wool. 

# He abruptly withdrew from public affairs and stopped attending meetings. 

# He also missed church services. 

# His colleagues repeatedly reduced and excused his levies  due to pay. They also hoped that John would make a recovery. But he never did.  

Stratford became a regular stop for travelling troupes in 1570. The performances of the troupes were keenly observed by Will, inculcated love for theatre and plays, and encouraged him to establish his career as an actor and playwright. 

Education: 

Shakespeare got admitted to King's School which was located at Guildhall, Church Street. Any boy who knew how to read and write got chance in this school. Shakespeare knew both. The headmaster's annual salary was 20 pounds and the three teachers of the school were Oxford men. Only boys attended school at the age of seven and spent 7-8 years. Usually, they spent long hours (from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.). However, there were only two short pauses. The seventh day of the week was for religious learnings. It is also notable that strict discipline was maintained in the school and the students who broke this discipline were flogged. 

Boys of Westminister School had to sleep in a windowless grain room, tolerate extreme heat, icy washes, meagre food and frequent whippings. 

Though Ben Jonson famously brought the charge against Shakespeare  that "Far from small Latin and less Greek," Shakespeare widely read both Latin and Greek in the school. He had read Homer's The Iliad, The Odyssey, Virgil's Aenid etcetera. Shakespeare spent time entirely in reading, writing, and reciting Latin in a whole-hearted and rigorous manner.  Besides, he also learned all the rhetorical devices simile, metaphor, anaphora, hyperbole, synecdoche, and others in Latin. He knew mathematics, geography, and history although he did not learn them from King's School. 

Unfortunately, Shakespeare's formal education was stopped at the age 15.The reason is not known. Scholars have revealed that Will committed poaching. He hunted the deer from the estate of Sir Thomas Lucy at Charlecote , fled from Avon, and came to London in 1585. 

  Shakespeare got married to pregnant Anne Hathaway at the age of 18. There is a rumour that Shakespeare was wooing Anne Whateley of nearby Temple Grafton at that time.

Shakespeare and Hathaway were parents to three children. The children were Susanna, Hamnet, and Judith. Susanna was born in 1583 and the twins Hamnet and Judith were born in 1585.

 

The Thames River and the London Bridge:

This river was thousand feet wide and the main artery for both goods and people. The river was not constrained by any kind of artificial embankment and could sprawl anywhere. It only had natural earthwork of sand and gravel. The London Bridge was situated over the river. This bridge set a connection between the rich and affluent Northern part (Londinium) and the poor Southern part of London (Southwark). Merchants came to sell their wares (goods) on the bridge. So, the bridge was the noisiest place and an outpost of wealthy merchants. It is also worthy to mention that water of the Thames river flowed through the narrow openings of the bridge and made the surface slippery and risky. The current through the bridge was quite strong and lots of people drowned regularly. The rapids of the river were so powerful that any attempt of steering through them was called “shooting the bridge” and people regularly drowned in the bridge. English naturalist and theologian Reverend John Ray in his A Collection of Proverbs of 1670 stated, “London Bridge was made for wise men to pass over and fools to pass under.” Habitations sprang up on the both sides of Londinium and Southwark.

 

On the Southwark side, there was a gatehouse where the decaying heads of the traitors were kept. The traitors had been beheaded for plotting machinations against the queen. Some Tudor heads include the names of Sir Thomas More, Bishop Fisher, and Thomas Cromwell. Shakespeare also saw the heads of his own distant relatives John Somerville and Edward Arden who were executed in 1583 for a fumbling plot with a view to killing Queen Elizabeth I.

The Thames was full of shrimps, breams, barbels, eels, trouts, swordfish, porpoises, and other exotic marine mammals.

The buildings on the bridge were quite dangerous since those were fire hazards (substances which increased the possibility of accidental fire occurring). Moreover, the buildings increased the load on the arches (the curved edges). During various mutinies, for example, the Peasants’ Revolt, the rebels put several buildings on fire. During the reign of Tudor Dynasty, around 200 buildings were on the bridge and they were seven-storied high. They were overhung not only the riverside but also the bridge side and so they created a tunnel through which carts and people had to pass. The tunnel was about 12 feet wide with two lanes. In the rush hour, it could take more than one hour to cross. The Lord Mayor decreed that people leaving London should move their carts on the East side and those who were coming to London should do so on the Western side. Many people believe that this is the origin of English driving on the left.

The origin of the bridge:

The first bridge was built by the Romans in 43 A.D. Basically, the Romans built a pontoon bridge which was planks laid across a row of anchored boats or ferry boats.

In 1014, London was held by the Danes. The Saxons, under King Ethelred the Unready, were joined by the Vikings who had been led by King Olaf form Norway. The coalitions of the Saxons and the Vikings set sail for the Thames River to attack the bridge and divide the Danes. However, the Danes protected their ships with the thatched roofs pulled from the cottages that stood on the bridge. They rowed under the bridge, bound their cables around the piles that supported the bridge, then rowed very quickly pulling the bridge down. Consequently, the London Bridge had to be rebuilt.

In 1176, the first stone bridge was founded under the supervision of Peter Colechurch. It took 33 years to be built and was completed in 1209. This bridge was 20 feet wide and 300 yards long. It was supported by 20 arches which curved to a Gothic-style point.  There was also a wooden drawbridge to keep the ships in and the invaders out. In the beginning, the flow of water was used to turn water wheels below the arches and later in 1580 to pump water into the city.

In 1212, fire broke out on the both sides of the bridge where a crowd of people was trapped and died. The fire incident again took place in 1623 when a maidservant left a pail of ashes under wooden stairs. 43 houses were damaged and many of the shops were burnt. By 1657, all the houses were pulled down. The bridge was widened and partly refurbished with a wide central arch. It stood like this till 1831. Later, the bridge went through other modern modifications.

The Globe Theatre:

It was octagonal in shape. The amphitheatrical design of this theatre was influenced by the classical text De Architectura by Vitruvius. It had an entrance door, exit door and two sets of stairs. There was also a central door with a double-width curtain or a discovery space for the entrance of the upper-class people. The curtain of the discovery space covered the big props like bed, throne etcetera. The command point was built by theatre walls. The stage was 5 feet high, 45 feet wide, and 30 feet long. The backstage was known as ‘Tiring House.’ A small house-like structure was known as ‘hut’ which was complete with a roof and served as a balcony. Moreover, there were two large pillars which were encrusted with zodiac signs supported a big roof over the stage known as ‘Heaven’. The trapdoor was known as ‘Hell’ through which ghosts and spirits could enter or disappear suddenly. It could also work as a grave.

The Globe Theatre gradually lost its appeal in the Restoration period.

This theatre was mainly a presentational theatre since it featured all the traits of a presentational theatre and the actors presented presentational acting in front of the audience.

The definition and features of presentational theatre:

Presentational theatre is a theatre where the actors act on a bare stage with minimum props and maintain eye-contact with the audience.

Features:

1)      Empty/bare stage

2)      Minimal props

3)      No curtain

Example: Greek theatre, Elizabethan theatre

Presentational acting:

This kind of acting refers to a particular acting style where the actors maintain eye-contact with the audience and deliver declamatory speeches so that they can reach all the audience.

William Shakespeare has enlivened his characters on the stage of The Globe Theatre with flair.

Members of the Globe and the Lord Chamberlain’s Men:

Richard and Cuthbert Burbage, William Shakespeare, John Hemings, Augustine Philips, Thomas Pope, and Will Kemp were the members of this theatre. It is referred to as “a theatre built by the actors for the actors” and described as “wooden O” in Henry V.

Lord Chamberlain’s Men was the playing company where William Shakespeare worked as an actor and playwright and dedicated almost a third of his career. This company was founded under the patronage of Henry Carey, 1^st Baron Hunsdon. Henry Carey was the son of William Carey and Mary Boleyn and the cousin of Queen Elizabeth I. After his death, his son George Carey, 2^nd Baron Hundson patronized the company. At that time, the company was known as Lord Hundson’s Men. When George Carey became Lord Chamberlain, the company was renamed as Lord Chamberlain’s Men.

How did London become a hub of theatre?

London’s first playhouse was the Red Lion in Whitechaple by an entrepreneur named John Brayne. Nothing much is known about this theatre. Brayne, along with his brother-in-law James Burbage built the Theatre in 1576 at Finsbury Fields in Shoreditch. James Burbage was a carpenter by trade but actor and impresario by nature.  Burbage’s long-time rival Henslowe built another theatre named the Curtain just across the road of Finsbury Fields. Thus, London became a truly theatrical place.

Philip Henslowe was the proprietor of the Rose and the Fortune. He was an impresario, money-lender, property investor, timber merchant, dyer, starch manufacturer, and most importantly a brothel keeper. He was popular with the playwrights for advancing them small sums and then keeping them in a kind of measured penury.

The notorious Bedlam (the first mental asylum in England) was situated very close to the Theatre. The areas of the playhouses were always noisy, crowded, and unhygienic. Gluemakers, soapmakers, dyers, tanners rendered bones and animal fats on the street which produced a detestable odour. Nobody could reach the playhouses without encountering a great deal of bad smell. The tanners steeped their products in the vats of dogs’ faeces to make them supple.

The finished plays needed a license from the Master of Revels (an executive officer from the royal household under the Lord Chamberlain) who made sure that the playwrights would perform and had written in a respectful and orderly way. Those who wrote anything against the Crown were arrested and jailed. After the ascension of James I in 1605, Ben Jonson and his collaborators on Eastward Ho! made some excellent but intemperate and unwisely remarks about the sudden flux in the ruling system and the Scots were arrested and threatened with having their ears and noses cut off.

Plays were performed at 2.00 p.m. Though the working-class people had to work in their farms from 6.00 a.m. to 6 p.m. in winter and 8 p.m. during the summer, they managed to visit the theatre at 2. Handbills were distributed so that people could know about the play. In the theatre, people had to pay a penny to enter, a penny more for a seat, and one more penny for a cushioned seat. The collected money was kept in a box and that box was safely kept in a room known as the box-office. There was no toilet facility in the theatre.

To earn money and engage the audience, it was necessary to produce new and newer plays constantly. Most of the companies had to perform 5 new plays in a week, sometimes 6. The leading actors had to memorize almost 15,000 lines, be acquainted with all props, cues, positions, entrances, exists, appear on the correct time being correctly attired. Actors were punished for missing rehearsals. In Spain, France, and Italy women could play their roles by themselves. At that time, plays were

1)      Longer

2)      More ambitious

3)      More spectacular

4)      More complex in construction

5)      More precise

6)      More bombastic according to Stanley Wells.

In the time of Shakespeare, there was no formal director. So, Shakespeare, himself, had to play the role of a “de facto” along with being a playwright, shareholder, and actor. That’s why, he could never act in the leading roles. It is also noteworthy that Shakespeare could stage his plays anywhere of the city he wished, for example, hillsides, fortes, castles, battlefields, islands, enchanted dells etcetera and the audience was persuaded to go. These places outside London were known as ‘Liberties.’ Unregulated activities were held in these areas and these areas were notorious for vagabonds, thieves, brothels, taverns, bear and bull baiting pits etcetera. As a result, plays were regarded as subversive activities for their disrespect of rules and regulations and proximity to the pleasures of the Liberties. The Puritan people thought that transvestism is a matter of corruption, confusion, and anxiety. Moreover, the stage was considered as a bed a of sodomy.

The Fortune Theatre:

The Fortune Theatre was agreed to be built in 1600 at the cost of 440 pounds in a contract. It was not like the Globe Theatre. It was larger and square rather than round. The detailed description of its height and depth of galleries, the thickness of the wood, the composition of the plaster walls immensely helped build the replica of the Globe in 1997.

The Plague:

In 1592, a plague broke out in England and it lasted till 1593. It left many families devastated and helpless. Bad harvests led to the soaring of price. Riots occurred for food and troops had been deployed to restore order. People died of starvation for the first time in England. They suffered from malnutrition. Moreover, the prices of poor people’ staple food, such as beans, peas, cereal, became double. The price of a loaf was still a penny. However, its size was shrunk from three and half pounds to eight ounces and often bulked with lentil, mashed acorns, and other adulterants.

Shakespeare composed his two long poems during the time of the plague.

The works of William Shakespeare:

1)      Henry Vi, part i, part ii, part iii   

2)      The Comedy of Errors                   

3)      Richard III                                  

4)      Titus Andronicus                          

5)      The Taming of the Shrew

6)      The Two Gentlemen of Verona

7)      Love’s Labour’s Lost

8)      Romeo and Juliet

9)      Richard II

10)  A Midsummer Night’s Dream

11)  King John

12)  The Merchant of Venice

13)  Henry IV, part i, part ii

14)  Much Ado About Nothing

15)  Henry V

16)  Julius Ceaser

17)  As You Like It

18)  Twelfth Night

19)  Troilus and Cressida

20)  Hamlet

21)  The Merry Wives of Windsor

22)  All’s Well That Ends Well

23)  Othello

24)  Measure for Measure

25)  King Lear

26)  Macbeth

27)  Antony and Cleopatra

28)  Timon of Athens

29)  Coriolanus

30)  Cymbeline

31)  The Winter’s Tale

32)  The Tempest

St. Paul’s Cathedral:

The St. Paul’s Cathedral was a dominant structure of London during the time of Queen Elizabeth. It had a 500 feet high sky-piercing steeple which was smashed by a strong lightning and was never replaced. It is said that the cathedral was burnt in 1666 due to the breaking out of the Great Fire. The cathedral was situated at an immensely open square which covered almost 12 acres. It had two-fold functions. It served both as cemetery and market. It was filled with the stalls of printers and stationers. Since printing press was first invented by William Caxton, printed books were affordable to everyone. More than seven thousand titles were published in London during the time of Elizabeth. Loads of raw materials were to be explored, absorbed, and reworked by the playwrights to entertain people.

The interior of the cathedral was busier and noisier.

# Carpenters, bookbinders, scriveners, lawyers, and others piled up their business here.

# Drunkards and vagabonds used it as a place of repose.

# Little boys played ball games.

# Others made small fire to keep them warm. ‘

# People used it as a shortcut during the rainy days.

Types of crime at that time:

The tendency of committing crime was widespread. Some became pickpockets or foists, nippers (snatching of purses), hookers (getting desirables through open windows using hooks), coney-catchers (catching rabbits illegally); others became abtams (who feigned lunacy to distract attention, whipjacks, fingerers, cross biters, courtesy men and many more. Brawling was the most common crime.

Even the literary figures carried arms. An actor named Gabriel Spencer killed a man named James Freak in a duel and was killed by Ben Jonson two years later. Christopher Marlowe was engaged with at least two fatal fights. He helped his colleague kill a young innkeeper. He, himself, was stabbed on his forehead while engaged in a scuffle being drunkard over a tavern bill.

The Guilds:

The guilds were the influential personalities of London who controlled the commerce. They were involved in civic duties. They played a major role in people’s life and they controlled people’s life as the way the trade was conducted. The chief of the guilds became the Mayor of London, the leading delegates became the Aldermen, and the other members of the Guilds became the burghers of London. Each guild had his own halls and coats of arms. The representatives of various Elizabethan London Guilds met together in a common Guild Hall.

The Reign of James I:

The duration of King James I’s reign was from 1603 to 1616. He was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots and thirty-six years old when he ascended the throne. Though he was a Protestant, he married to a Catholic woman. He was James VI of Scotland, but James I of England. James I believed in ghosts and witches and he also believed in the ‘Divine Rights of King.’ He composed the book Demonology. The king had some disconcerted habits. Those are:

1)      He was graceless in motion with a strange, lurching gait.

2)      He constantly played with his codpiece.

3)      He had an odd shape which was exaggerated by wearing extravagantly padded jackets and pantaloons to protect him from assassin’s daggers.

4)      His tongue appeared to be too large to his mouth and made him drink very uncomely or indecent. It seemed as if he had been eating his drink.

5)      He daubed his had time to time with little water. One could easily identify all his meals from the stains and gravy scabs on his clothing.

6)      In 1604, he spent a staggering 47,000 pounds on jewels. Once he bought two thousand pairs of gloves at a time.

James I had eight children with his wife Queen Anne. He was a generous patron of drama. He renamed the Lord Chamberlain’s Men as the King’s Men. It was an award to Shakespeare and his colleagues. The King’s Men were provided with all types of facilities. The players had to garment themselves with four and half yards of scarlet cloth. The troupe performed more than 187 times in front of the king in between his ascension and Shakespeare’s death.  William Shakespeare dedicated Macbeth to the king.

James I also presided over the new ‘Authorized Version’ or ‘King James Version’ of the Bible which took 7 years to be produced. The king strongly kept the Catholics under control. In his time, perhaps 2% of the whole population was actively Catholic. The Catholics placed 36 barrels of gunpowder beneath the Palace of Westminister to murder the king and his whole family. The mastermind of this conspiracy was Robert Catesby who was a distant relative of Shakespeare by marriage. Catesby was a loyal Protestant but was converted to Catholicism with the death of his wife. James I took several steps against the Catholics. These are:

1)      The Catholics were barred from all the main professions.

2)      They were not permitted to travel more than five miles from home.

3)      Recusancy fine was heavily imposed on them. ( the Catholics were bound to pay this fine if they showed any disrespect to Protestantism)

The King’s Men opened The Blackfriars Theatre which brought more profit than The Globe since even the cheapest seat cost 6 pence.

Earl of Essesx and Queen Elizabeth:

      Earl of Essex was the step-son of Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester and one of the queen’s favourites. Essex was 33 years younger than the queen, but he was charming enough to win the queen’s heart. Earl of Essex was reckless, headstrong, and arrogant too.

In the final years of the queen’s reign, some tensions were prevailing in the country. The queen faced threat from one of her Privy Councilors Robert Devereux, the second Earl of Essex.

Privy Council: It is a group of senior politicians who give advice to the monarch in the time of taking any legal step and official decision.

Besides, the country had been in war with Spain and the relationship between England and Ireland were on a rebellious term. Moreover, there was a strong growing unrest in the country due to high taxes and bad harvests.

In 1587, Elizabeth made Essex her Master of Horse, a court position which was previously held by Robert Dudley. For holding this decision, Essex could come closer to Elizabeth. He became a Privy Councilor in 1593 and led a successful expedition to attack the Spanish mutineers at the port of Cadiz and defeated them with glory. He returned to England in 1593 as a hero.

Nevertheless, this close relationship turned into bitterness with the course of time. Queen Elizabeth promoted Robert Cecil as Secretary of State, a senior member of the Privy Council since Cecil’s father was too crippled to hold this position. Essex could not accept this decision, wanted to influence the queen, and thereby exercise power over the royal patronage.

Patronage: the decision of appointing someone in a vital position in the court.

As a result, Essex and Cecil started making factions at the court what Elizabeth always wanted to avoid in her reign. After the success of Spanish expedition, Essex was sent to Ireland to fight with the rebels. Instead of continuing the war, he declared a truce against the queen’s order. As punishment, he was banned from the royal court put in house arrest and financially ruined.

When he was freed, he vowed to take more drastic steps. He made a scheme to dethrone the queen. Being supported by 300 men (Catholics, Puritans, and some former soldiers who were impressed by his military skills), he decided to take the control of the Tower of London first and then the Whitehall(the palace of the queen) and arrest the queen. He actually wanted to place James VI. Essex was confident that many people would come to make this plot successful, but nobody came. He was befuddled about what to do and fled to his house. Later, he was arrested and executed in 1601. Meyerick, Southampton, and five other followers were also executed.

Essex’s accomplice, Meyerick asked Lord Chamberlain’s Men to perform Richard II for a special payment of 2 pounds. He specially instructed to include the scenes where the king was deposed and murdered. But these scenes were absolutely sensitive at that time and nobody dared to think about it. The Elizabethan audience knew that history is not a remote account of something that happened long ago, but it reflects the present too. So, staging Richard II was obviously a seditious exercise. However, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men agreed to perform it.