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GARRICK's FOLLY: the Shakespeare Jubilee of 1769 at Stratford And ROUTLEDGE LIBRARY EDITIONS: SHAKESPEARE IN PERFORMANCE Volume 8 GARRICK’S FOLLY This page intentionally left blank GARRICK’S FOLLY The Shakespeare Jubilee of 1769 at Stratford and Drury Lane JOHANNE M. STOCHHOLM First published in 1964 This edition first published in 2014 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 1964 Johanne M. Stochholm All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-138-78774-2 (Set) eISBN: 978-1-315-76168-8 (Set) ISBN: 978-1-138-79291-3 (Volume 8) eISBN: 978-1-315-76167-1 (Volume 8) Publisher’s Note The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this book but points out that some imperfections from the original may be apparent. Disclaimer The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and would welcome correspondence from those they have been unable to trace. Garrick’s Folly THE SHAKESPEARE JUBILEE OF I769 AT STRATFORD AND DRURY LANE by Johanne M. Stochholm M E T H U E N & C O L T D II NEW FETTER LANE LONDON EC4 First published in 1964 © Johanne M. Stockholm, 1964 Printed in Great Britain by Richard Clay Co Ltd The Chaucer Press, Bungay, Suffolk Contents I Planning and Preparations page I II Description of the Jubilee 51 III Public Reactions to the Jubilee 108 IV The Jubilee on the LondonStage: the Rival Managers 143 Index 175 vii Garrick embracing the Bust of Shakespeare (Engraving by Valentine Greene from Thomas Gainsborough’s painting commissioned bv the Stratford upon Avon Corporation for their new Town Hall. The original painting was destroyed by fire in 194.6.) Illustrations I . P L A T E S Garrick Embracing the Bust of Shakespeare frontispiece (Engraving by Valentine Greene from Thomas Gainsborough's painting commissioned by the Stratford upon Avon Corporation for their new Town Hall. The original painting was destroyed by fire in 1946.J 1 New Place with Guildhall and Chapel facing page 6 (from R. B. Wheler's History and Antiquities of Stratford) 2 The Mulberry Box 7 (now in the British Museum) 3 Commemorative Handkerchief 54 {in the possession of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust: believed to be unique) 4 The Scene at the High Cross 55 {contemporary water-colour in the possession of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust) 5 Garrick as Steward 62 (Engraving by T. Saunders from the painting by Benjamin Van der Gucht) 6 The Jubilee Medal 63 Garrick’s Medallion (Shakespeare Birthplace Trust) 7 Thomas King and Mrs Baddeley, in The Clandestine Marriage 88 (oil painting in the possession of the Garrick Club) 8 Dr Arne 89 (Engraving from a drawing by Bartolozzi) 9 Samuel Foote 118 (oil painting in the possession of the Garrick Club) ix X List of Illustrations 10 Th e Procession at Stratford (as it should have been) 1 1 9 (from the Oxford Magazine, September and October 1769) 11 The Rival Managers 152 (from the Ladies' Magazine, September, 1769) 12 Title-page to The Jubilee or Shakespeare's Garland 15 3 (from The Stratford Jubilee, a scrapbook, British Museum) II. ContractContract ILLUSTRATIONS IN TEXT Shakespeare’s Birthplace page 2 (from The Gentleman’s Magazine, Ju ly 1679) Th e Amphitheatre 13 (from The Gentleman’s Magazine, September 1769) Ticket of Admission 36 (in possession of the Folger Shakespeare Library) The Loving Cup 60 (from a newspaper cutting in The Stratford Jubilee, a scrapbook, British Museum ) Garrick Reciting the Ode at Stratford 70 (from The Town and Country Magazine, September 1769) Boswell as a Corsican Chief 99 (from The London Magazine, September, 1769) Th e Jubilee Handbill 104 (British Museum) Garrick Reciting the Ode at Drury Lane 124 (British Museum) Principal Characters in the Procession *54-5 (Anonymous engraving found lying loose in John Bayne Collier's own copy of his English Dramatic Poetry at the Folger Shakespeare Library) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am most grateful to the following persons and institutions for allowing me to reproduce the illustrations mentioned: the British Museum (Frontispiece, Plates 2, 5, 8, 1 1 , 1 2 ; illustrations on pp. 60, 99, 104, 124 ); the Folger Shakespeare Library (illustrations on pp. 36, 154-5); the Garrick Club (Plates 7 and 9); the Royal Shakespeare Theatre Library (Plate 1 o); the Shakespeare Birth­ place Trust (Plates 1, 3, 4) Preface As a small contribution to the celebrations due in 1964 to mark the quatercentenary of Shakespeare’s birth, it occurred to me that it might be appropriate to give a fairly detailed account of the first national Shakespeare Festival, the Stratford Jubilee in 1769. Th e circumstances that led to the planning of a Jubilee at that parti­ cular time, the preparations made for it, the misfortunes encoun­ tered during the three-day celebration, and the literary and drama­ tic activities aroused by it in the months immediately following seem to me sometimes pathetic, sometimes amusing, but definitely interesting. M y object has not been to prove anything new about the Jubilee, but to reconstruct it in full and authentic detail. In order to accomplish this I have drawn indiscriminately on documents already collected by others and on matter turned up by my own examination of contemporary newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets, and books, such as biographies and memoirs, etc. I want to thank Professor Frederick A . Pottle of Yale Univer­ sity and Dr James G . McManaway of the Folger Shakespeare Library for encouragement and advice during the preparation of this work, and likewise to thank Ethel Ramage and Sarah T . Ramage of Sweet Briar College, Virginia; Margaret P. Boddy, Winona College, Minnesota; Donald W . Hannah and Ann Draycon of the University of Aarhus; and Michael P. Rhodes of University College, London, for valuable suggestions and some clerical assistance. I am grateful to Sweet Briar College for a faculty grant that made it possible for me to obtain needed photo­ stats of rare materials and to Aarhus University, Denmark, for ex­ emption from teaching duties during the spring semester of 1963. xi Contract Contract I wish to thank the Folger Shakespeare Library for permission to quote matter from Garrickiana /, Collectanea, the Garrick manuscript 'Journal of Journey to France and Italy, Messink Order of the Pageant in the Jubilee (references to all of which will be found in footnotes passim): also Messrs. Heinemann and the M cG raw Hill Book Company for the use of material in The Private Papers of James Boswell, 6, Boswell in Search of a Wife (edited by Frank Brady and Frederick A . Pottle). (M y page re­ ferences are to the American edition.) I also gratefully acknow­ ledge the use I have been able to make of ‘The Jubilee’, the manuscript which was discovered by Professor Elizabeth P. Stein in the Huntington Library and published by her in Three Plays by David Garrick. I should like to express my gratitude for efficient and courteous service received at the British Museum, the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Yale University Library, the Libraries of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, the Shakespeare Museum, Stratford upon Avon and the Garrick Club. Aarhus University, johanne m . stochholm Aarhus, Denmark September 196 3 Contract Planning and Preparations It is surprising to the modern reader and theatre-goer that no large Shakespeare Festival should have been held before 1769, but it must be remembered that al­ though some of his plays were performed during the Restoration period, they were not nearly so popular with audiences as the plays of Jonson and of Beaumont and Fletcher. It should, however, be noted that many edi­ tions of Shakespeare’s plays had been published before 1769. The First Folio had been reprinted in 1632, 1663, and 1685, and in the eighteenth century a number of editions had appeared, the most important being those of Rowe (1709), Pope (1723—25), Theobald (1733—34), Warburton (1747), Johnson (1765), and Capell (1768). Dryden had given high praise to Shakespeare as a dramatist in his Essay of Dramatic Poesy (1668). In the early years of the eighteenth century Shakespeare’s plays were coming into their own again and were more frequently performed (although often in altered ver­ sions) than those of his contemporaries. Their popularity was much increased when David Garrick, the famous actor, during his long career (1747—76) as actor and later actor-manager of Drury Lane Theatre, pro­ duced twenty-seven of the plays and acted in many of them. His efforts on behalf of his favourite author were so successful that a very real interest in Shakespeare and 2 Garrick's Folly his plays was evident in London in 1769, the year of the Stratford Jubilee. Before this time comparatively little interest had been taken in Stratford as Shakespeare’s birthplace. Some writers, critics, and actors did occasionally visit Strat­ ford — Garrick, for instance, had been there as a young man in x 744 — but no concerted effort had been made to draw the general public to the town. However, with the IlUifit/e in tSimgfo/riufiosiylven, in> {At /i&nottj '/c*/ S/ui/rjjfisdr //rrs /iant \ Shakespeare’s Birthplace (from The Gentleman*s Magazine, July 1769) growing interest in Shakespeare shown by London audiences the people of Stratford began to realize the importance of Shakespeare and of everything connected with him in the town, such as the house where he was born and his tomb and monument in the church.
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