Shakespeare

The boys’ companies were the darlings of the hour, taking their roles in allegorical drama, classical drama and satirical drama. It may now seem to be an odd taste, among the Elizabethans, for child actors rather than adult actors; but it is connected with the sacred origins of the drama and with the desire to purge it from all associations with vulgarity or vagabondage. Theirs was a form of “pure” theatre in every sense. There were the Children of St. Paul’s, who performed in the precinct of the cathedral, and the Children of the Chapel Royal, who made use of rooms in the old monastery of Blackfriars by the river. They became part of the theatrical ferment of the time. After James Burbage had erected the Theatre in 1576 a musician and playwright, Richard Farrant, rented a hall in the Blackfriars which became known as “the private house in the Blackfriars”; here, under the pretext that they were rehearsing for the queen’s court performances, the Children of the Chapel Royal could attract high-paying customers. From so early a date, therefore, there was in London an “indoor” as well as an “outdoor” playhouse. It would have been inconceivable at the time that the “indoor” theatre would eventually become the choice of the world.

In 1583-through the agency of the Earl of Oxford – the Children of the Chapel Royal secured the services of John Lyly who, with euphonious and stylised dramas such as Campaspe and Sapho and Phao, diverted the more discerning playgoer with displays of courtly dialogue and intricate plots. Lyly had already gained a considerable reputation with his narratives Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit and Euphues and His England, two prose romances which with their intricate and rhetorical style created the literary fashion known as “euphuism”; it was a style that Shakespeare imitated and parodied in equal measure, but it is true to say that none of his comedies is unaffected by it. It was the modern style. Anyone who wished to be contemporary, and of the moment, used it. Like all egregiously modern styles it faded very rapidly.

The residents of Blackfriars were not happy with the press of people who attended the productions of the Chapel Royal Children, however, and in 1584 the owner of the building forced out the boys and masters. So Lyly transferred his attentions to the Children of St. Paul’s, and for some years his “court comedies” continued to charm private audiences. More importantly, for him if not for posterity, his plays were also regularly performed at court, where Elizabeth herself was entertained by the classical allegories he devised. His was in a sense a royal art. When Shakespeare arrived in London Lyly was reaching the height of his success; the most distinguished and artful of all his productions, Endimion, was performed in 1588. He wrote about the mysteries and possibilities of love, both in comic and in sentimental manner; he employed pastoral settings; he created intricate patterns of human behaviour as if they were part of a measured dance; he mixed farce and bawdry with romance and mythology; he charmed audiences with the beauty of his expression; he infused his plots with comedy and with an overwhelming geniality of mood. It is easy to understand the effect upon the young Shakespeare, who had never before seen such plays. It was a new dramatic world of lyrical statement and romantic intrigue. Where would Love’s Labour’s Lost and A Midsummer Night’s Dream be without the influence of Lyly? There are many passages in Shakespeare’s plays that are strikingly reminiscent of Lyly. Shakespeare was indeed a great cormorant of other writers’ words. Moreover Lyly, just ten years older than Shakespeare, was already a fashionable and relatively wealthy man who was about to be appointed as a Member of Parliament. There was no better advertisement for the rewards of the theatre, albeit of the courtly or private kind. He spurred Shakespeare’s ambition as well as his creation.

Yet the rise of the professional adult companies, employing young playwrights and larger bands of actors, steadily eclipsed the popularity of the boys and displaced the reputation of John Lyly. By 1590 the children had effectively disappeared, only to emerge a decade later under the guidance of yet another new wave of playwrights. Lyly spent his last years vainly seeking court preferment, as aspiring Master of the Revels, and living in what might be called genteel poverty. He wrote nothing for the last twelve years of his life, since the wheels of fashion and literary taste had turned a revolution. “I will cast my wits in a new mould,” he wrote in 1597, “for I find it folly that one foot being in the grave, I should have the other on the stage.”²